The Tooth Fairy

Tooth mouse
Isn't it funny how kids don't know the value of money until their teeth start falling out!Between the two of them, Jesse and Tanner have lost 7 teeth on this 6 month trip. Now normally in S.A. the tooth mouse (well only Tanner believed in the tooth mouse till recently),will dish out between R5.00 and R10.00 BUT now MY kids have figured that R10.00 is only 1 Euro in France and really! what can you do with 1 Euro! So between the two of them, they figure that anything you can buy for R10.00 in South Africa costs a whole lot more here, so 4 Euro's is a good figure for loosing teeth!!!!!! I think my kids have a good future to work in Government, as they have already figured out how to get as much money as they can out of mom and dad. Well they got what they wanted in the first lot of teeth but we didn't realise that they would keep on jolly loosing the teeth. I am sure that their karate manouevers are for this intention only! Anyway, for those of you who have been seeing photos of Tanner with an odd shaped tooth (the only tooth left in the middle front had been moved and was hanging weird) - well it finally came out 3 days ago - with the help of a karate kick from Jetan! What can I say, he is learning from the older two!
Tanner is quite happy, he is a bit richer and he now does not need to worry about the tooth. This is the tooth that we were considering seeing a dentist in France about - but even though we paid an arm and a leg for travel medical insurance, they still wanted the first R2000.00 out of us which was not refundable - so hey! maybe paying the 4 Euros a tooth is not so bad after all. Needless to say, they actually don't have this money yet, I told them it will be put in their bank account in S.A. Of course they now got clever and want to know - If the exchange rate gets worse does that mean they get more money??? Not stupid kids we have raised I can tell you!
Okay - where are we?
We left Chamonix a few days ago - VERY sad to leave our Winter Wonderland. Looking at the photographs don't help because I just want to go back. We decided to leave on Thursday and make our way to Le Mont St Michel. It was basically about a 16 hr trip in our little van. On Thursday night we stayed over in Beaune. The next morning we met a couple who had been in their van for a year. It was not even a camper van and had no shower or toilet just a converted truck. They spent 6 months working in vineyards and 6 months holidaying. The husband had been living in the van for 6 YEARS! Anyway they approached us asking where they could find water. For those of you who read our last Blog when we were in Beaune (this was during the Rugby Final), you will remember that we also had trouble finding water cause the government turns off all the taps and trust me the French aren't too happy to give water. The couple, that we watched the rugby final at, have a little boy who suggested that we go to a certain park and "under the ivy" we will find a tap. Well at that time we did find the tap. So "Sure" we say to the couple, we will take you to the water but we couldn't quite remember how to get there. So off we drove to the Tourist Information who were closed! VERY IRRITATING - everything closes between 12pm and 2pm in France but thank goodness they had maps of the city outside their door so we could look on the map and see where the park was.
Off we headed only to discover that the tap had had the end taken off it so we could not get water after all but there was a silverlining to our cloud, the toilets were open BUT have you ever tried to fit a 25 litre jerry can under a tap that has a basin under it - it doesn't work!!! So we tried filling up a jug and filling up the jerry can but because of the angle of the basin and the size of the jug, we could only fill up the jug about a third of the way and pour that into the jerry can. The husband runs to his van and comes back with a hose and promptly holds it under the tap and commences to fill his jerry can. They then proceeded to fill up ours which was a huge relief.
Our journey continued to Mont-Saint-Michel but we had to make another stop - sorry I can't remember the name of the place but we left very early that morning and Dean drove non-stop until we reached Mont-Saint-Michel. In those last 2 days he drove on average about 8 hrs a day in the pouring rain. Mont-Saint-Michel to look at was absolutely stunning. Will send you all a pic as soon as I have downloaded them. Of course it was still raining and the wind was really cold but we trekked to the little town. For those of you who don't know - it is an island steeped in history (Dean knows more about that than I do).
The views from the top were stunning and we were not sorry that we had trekked all the way to see it. We only spent Saturday night here. Once you've seen the island there is really nothing else to see, so we left on Sunday morning - once again it was pouring with rain.
For the first time in 6 months, this part of the trip was not REALLY planned - by this I mean, this part of the trip (last few days) has just been a means to an end. That end being getting to Calai tomorrow by 12:30 pm to catch our ferry at 2 pm.
The day before yesterday we stayed in a city called Rouene. It was our plan to stay at least 2 nights but finding the internet connection there was terrible. That night we found an IBIS hotel (this is where most of our hotspots have been), and I literally had to walk to the front of the hotel and sit there and try and connect. I really tried but my fingers were too cold so I had to go in and ask if I could connect in the hotel, thank gooness the guy was nice enough to say yes. The next morning we had the same problem. I once again had to go into the hotel, this time a Formule 1 hotel. There was only wifi in the rooms so the receptionist was kind enough to open up a room for me, I was there 10 minutes and the new occupants of the room arrived, so I had to leave. We then decided, it was time to leave Rouene so we carried on driving and I am typing from where we have ended up - in Boulogne.
What a cute town and I am happy we decided to move on with the trip to get here. We are currently parked on a quay - quay's have featured quite a bit in our sleeping/travel arrangements over the last few months. Would you ever DREAM of sleeping in the harbour in Durban or on the beachfront???
Yesterday I ventured into the little town (thank goodness we had a bit of sun, but Dean said that he was feeling the coldest he had in a long time because of the wind) and was happy to find a laundromat and a Boulangerie (bakery) - boy are we going to miss the baguettes. Just a quick diversion - Dean goes to a bakery the other day and asks for 2 baguettes and points to them. Well he was quickly reprimanded in French as to the fact that those were NOT baguettes but Pain! Now Pain actually means bread - isn't a baguette bread?????? Now you can see that bread (in any size, shape or form) is pretty serious business to the French.

At the moment we are all out of gas. We were so hoping to not have to fill up the gas bottle. We need to return the one gas bottle to Brian (Samantha's uncle) but his is a English gas bottle with different connection and we wanted to fill that one up for him BUT now we have to fill the French one as well and it's for ONE DAY ONLY! How frustrating. Unfortunately, no gas means, no cooking, no tea (Jetan will never forgive me), no fridge and no heat! I am currently sitting in the van at 10am and I am blowing smoke - Let me repeat mysel - I AM IN THE VAN!!!
Having all the rain in the last few days has not helped our slump into a slight depression because we now have to go home. I have made comments throughout the last 6 months regarding the bathing,cooking,sleeping arrangements but to be honest, I am dreading our last night in the campervan. This is to be tomorrow night!
Friday, we go to Gavin and Glenda and spend a weekend with them. Sunday we hope to spend some time with Adrian and Wanda and the English's - Remember Larry and Juliet - well they've immigrated.
Then on Monday, we head for Stockton - about a 4 hour drive for us - hopefully we will see more snow but at least we will be bundled up and warm inside Alan and Sue's cozy home.
We fly back on the 28th, arrive Joburg the 29th, drive to Durban on the 30th.
Watch this space for our final blog :(
AND
An email with the photograph of our future camper van - Yay!!!!!

Update from Dean

Well helllooooo all ye friends and family out there :)

Tis I...the old man...41 in a few hours....but what a place to turn a year older.....Charmonix in France. My eyesight is going, because I am standing in the cold...4 degrees....checking my emails to clear the business plate before the morning rush.....now would a Telkom guy come out and check your email if it got THAT cold....hmmmm....I'm standing outside the info office...me and some guy who seems to be making full use of the free internet by listening to breakdance music.....aarrghhhh...... :) I guess he's far from home like us..

We had great fun this weekend. After smashing the kitchen tray trying to slide down a slope of snow yesterday, I decided the kids could have some real fun and bought them some plastic snowboard thingies.... welll.......they ended up hurtling down these huge snow slopes, with Ski-ers looking on in horror, with Jetan screaming...FASTERRRRR FASTERRRR....!!!! (we have pics to prove it:)

The snowthingies are now all tied to the back of the camper along with the bikes. Last night I slept with them, cause M was with Jetan and the boys shared the main bed, and I grabbed the last small piece of sleeping area. (tonight I get the main bed withTanner....o what fun...)

bbbrrrrr it's getting colder as I write this blog. I'm about to go down and see if I can carry on from the McDonalds....so till later.....

Bye:))
D

Into the Snow we Go

Hello All,
I can't remember when we last blogged so am just going to have to ramble on from where I can actually remember. It doesn't help that Dean constantly changes his mind about where we are going next!
After promising my mom's dear Aunt Tate Lou to revisit, we finally headed back to her home in Caromb.We stayed over 2 nights at her house but did sleep in the camper van. She was such a lovely hostess, and once again I had to keep the conversation going as all Dean could say was "Oui" - this said "we", which you will all know translates to "Yes". On the Saturday we visited her son and his wife and met members of their family. Once again, my French language skills were put to the test. No-one in the family speaks English.We were served a lovely meal. Although the boys do not completely enjoy the different foods served, they do enjoy the manner in which a French meal is served. There is ALWAYS a baguette on the table and salad is always served, whnether it be a green salad or various salads such as carrot, or cabbage or beetroot. Then comes the hot part of the meal, the comes the cheese platter, and then comes chocolate pudding with a whipped cream - but it tastes so much better than our cream. AND there is always wine and water at the table. Oh I also forget, before they serve the meal they have an Apperitif. There are no side plates so the French keep their piece of Baguette on the dining room table cloth - rather strange - we always put it on a side plate or our main plate. The boys have said that they would like our meals to be done in this way. Oh yeah right - I need to serve a 3 course meal each night!
On Saturday night we had supper with Tate Lou. She made a lovely soup and of course there were Baguettes on the table. My children promptly began to dunk their bread in the soup. The look on her face was priceless. They do NOT do that in France BUT the next morning, we discover that they do dunk their baguette or toast in their coffee which may I add is often drunk not from a cup but from a bowl.
I was very sad to leave my newly found family but look forward to returning to see them in the future.
Sunday bought a very exciting day ahead where I would visit the house that we are dealing with. I had made a time to visit the lady at 10am. We left Tate Lou a bit late and as a result only got there a bit before 11am to discover that she was not there. I was really irritated, especially since there was not even a note left for me. I left one for the tenant and told her where we were parked. Well 3 hrs later, there was a knock on our window - It wasn't that it had slipped her mind, she had completely forgotten I had even called her to make the appointment!Anyway off we headed to the house and I was given a tour. Oh my goodness! What a state the house is in! Let me give you a quick rundown - It is basically two houses (one with 3 levels and the other with 4 levels) but they are joined by a central cement spiral staircase which winds it's way all the way down. Both sides of the house have a front street entrance but only the house with 3 levels is accessible from behind. It is rather big but lots of work needs to be carried out. At the moment, the current tenant, is only using the house to store her belongings. Her belongings include every possible tool,nut,bolt on earth (belonging to her late husband) as well as some of the most beautiful old furniture that I have seen. To move everything out of the house will take a team of about 20 people about a month I'm sure!
After having taken lots of photographs, we headed back to Marseille.
Jean-Luc (my 5th cousin) had arranged a meeting with the new Notary who will be dealing with the house issue. The meeting was to be at 9am on Monday morning. This was a scary thought. When you enter Marseille it literally swallows you up. We had planned to stay at Gemenos which is about 25 minutes out of Marseille as we knew that there was an Aire to stay at there. Jean-Luc warned us that at the very LEAST we need to leave the Aire at 7am to get to him by 8pm to attend the meeting at 9am. My email to him said that it would be a miracle if we got there on time, and his response to me was "The Family Squire needs to make a miracle ". So we decide to rather find a place closer and we tried to park near the church where we had parked a few weeks before. However there was no place outside the church so that left us looking elsewhere. We eventually found a place very nearby in a Petrol Station. We weren't totally convinced that this was THE place to spend the night in Marseille but on opening our computer and the WIFI icon started flashing at us, we decided, well if we have internet here, then this is where we are staying.
On Monday morning, we woke up rather early, I got dressed, and armed with my file of documents that Jean-Luc had so kindly put together the last time I saw him. Dean dropped me off and he headed back to the same place he had parked the night before and was going to work.
We met with the new Notary that morning and now my brain is filled with so many thoughts regarding the house. So many things to now work through. Anyway it was so nice to chat to Jean-Luc again and to see Christine (even though it was just for a few minutes).
We left Jean-Luc at about midday and headed towards Sisteron (another change of plans!), we found an Aire next to a beautiful mountain. What a stunning little town. Dean said he would be quite happy to retire there. The next morning, we walked around for a bit, found some water (which let me tell you is getting harder to come by because the government switches everything off in Winter) and then decided it was time to move on.We moved on to a town called "Gap". Not much to see there, just a fairly large town that has a Carasol. All French towns have a carasol. We parked in an open sand paved parking lot which definitely had a sign that said "No Caravaning or Camping" - but we figured, we don't have a caravan and camping by "south African standards"is pitching a tent and we weren't doing neither. The parking lot was fairly quiet and it gave us an opportunity to run the generator. Oh and a bonus. ONCE AGAIN on opening up the laptop we discover there is an open network, so Dean could do some work.We left the morning after and made our way to Grenoble. It was our intention to stay there but on entering it just discoverd that it is simply another city full of hustle and bustle. We have grown to hate these towns and far prefer the quaint little villages that we pass through. I must say that the drive to Grenoble was absolutely breath-taking. Although it was up and down windy mountain roads, seeing the snow-capped mountains in the distance was awesome! AND scary. I'm cold now - how am I going to feel when we get to the mountains. Driving led us past frost covered trees and grass. We stopped at a petrol station and a guy who parked next to us had a thick layer of ice on the sides of his windscreen. - Gulp!
In order to get the kids out a bit as all they had seen was the inside of the camper van for a few days, we decided to find a park where they could play and I would make supper, we would then tuck them up in their beds and move on.
Finding a park was not too difficult but we were even happier to find water in the park. The kids played a bit, they came in and showered, we ate and we then headed on through the mountains to Chambery.
We battled to find a place to stay in Chambery and drove for quite a while. Eventually just parking in the first available place we could find that was out the centre of the city. This morning when I woke up, I must have lain in bed for about an hour willing my body to get up, but I was just too cold. Although the entire time I lay there I kept on thinking, any minute now BOJ No. 3 (Bundle of Joy) No. 3 - this being Jetan, is going to wake up and say "Make me some tea"- He says this every morning!!! and I dread it! I was so greatful to Jesse this morning when I heard his voice come up and say that he would do it. My first response was - forget the tea - put the heater on - please!!!
We had every intention of walking around Chambery today but I needed to get some washing done. So after spending about 2 hrs parked outside a hotel that had an Orange Signal that we could connect to (unfortunately it's one we pay for), we then searched for the laundromat that we had driven past the night before. We located that quite easily.
While the washing was being done, Jesse decides that we need to walk to the Boulangerie (this is the bakery) to get some more baguettes. I say to him, okay I'll come with you. Well it was 10 minutes of walking and I was absolutely miserable. I only had a thin T-Shirt and my one jacket on and Jeans. I could feel my lips going blue! Needless to say, I refused to do any more walking today.
This afternoon we decided to find more gas because we are running out and all we need is to run out of gas! No gas, means no cooking, no showering and NO HEAT! We found some and we are now driving towards a place called Ugine. This is not meant to be a destination for us but Dean changed his mind today and decided that driving to Annecy which is where we were supposed to go for tomorrow is simply a waste of driving. So now we all sit in the car and head into the unknown. This unknown does not appear to have an Orange wifi hotspot so we may only be able to connect on Monday morning when we finally do get to Annecy.
If you see this blog before Monday, then you know we got lucky and found wifi.
During this weekend, we are braving the very cold weather and going to Charmonix-Mont-Blanc. This is where the snow is. On one hand I want to play in snow but on the other hand I don't think I want to be any more colder than I have been in the last 2 days.
Well watch this space, you'll soon know.
xxx M

News from the Med.

ello everyone. Dean here.! Well, I cant remember where I left off with blogging, so this is going to be a bit of a ramble about stuff that you wont neccessarily find the most interesting I'm sure, but hey....tough...ha ha. Here I sit, next to a brilliant fire, in a brilliant fireplace, in a brilliant "summer home" , owned by M's relatives in France....lovely people who seem to have it all together..own business, a few houses, one in the centre of Marseille, where you walk out the building and you're in the middle of wild pedestrians, cars, buses, etc etc... We arent in Marseille now though...we're 3hours out of Marseille, near St Tropez.
Marseille was a real bonus to our overseas trip. I didnt expect it to be, but we were given a car to loan for a few days, so I had some fun driving in French traffic, something you would think would be a nightmare (was for M) but for me, it was fun fun fun! The car we loaned was a really old Renault, but it had some fire under the bonnet and I found I could hit the petrol and speed off down the road, just like a real french driver. In france you cant be a timid driver, or you will cause a traffic jam. If there is a gap in the traffic, you just have to floor the pedal and claim your spot. Really EXHILLARATING! I LOVED IT! I figured the car I had been loaned had dents and scratches, and every other car in Marseille is dented and scratched too ( this is a fact...it is so funny to see). I just figured I was in a big dodgems track :)

The end of our holiday is nearing. About 6 weeks left. It leaves a bit of a bad taste in our mouths, because after 120days on the road, we have gotten used to being in strange towns, sleeping in strange parking lots:) We've gotten used to not knowing what tomorrow will bring, or where we will spend it. We've gotten used to living in a small confined space, 5 individuals, all sharing the same physical few square metres. It's been fun,tiring,inspiring,life-changing,and really cool. 10 years ago we did a similar trip, but that holiday was only 6 weeks in total, so having 6 weeks left of this holiday is not too bad I guess. M and I will be sitting down tonight deciding on whether we should go from St Tropez, to Nice, up through Italy to Lugano in Switzerland, use the Swiss motorways to get back to Annecy in France, make a trip back down to Carpentras to see Tate Lou ( a dear old relative of Marielle's mom, whom we promised we would revisit before leaving France), and then heading up the west coat of France to Calais, Dover, and the UK. Alternatively we might skip Italy, and just make a B-line for the UK, where we have better Internet. I think I feel like doing the Italy trip through Switzerland though...:))) We managed to use swissCom for hotspot Internet connections in Switzerland, and Lugano is an Italian town, but actually Swiss. Secretly we are hoping to hit some serious snow. It is nearing December, and snow should be falling:) Temperatures are falling, even down on the Mediterannean, so making a trip through Italy/Switzerland, and Charmonix/Annecy (the biggest snow centre in France) , is really a little risky, but hey.....you only live once:)

We have been undecided about what to do with our small motorhome once the holiday is over. Option1 = sell it. Option2 = keep it. Option 1 is good if we arent coming back to Europe. Option2 is good if we are, except that the van needs a new toilet fitted. At the moment we have kind of decided on Option2...and planning to come back to Europe in June/July/Aug next year. If any of you want to rent the van before or after those months, it will be sitting in Amsterdam waiting to be picked up from the dealer, who can easily arrange the insurance for you. We can give you all the info you need on where to stay, how to get Internet etc etc. We've learned such a lot. Time to write that book :)

Each country we have visited have been completely different in the way people live. For the past few months I havent actually had a decent conversation with anyone besides Bonjour, Oui, Non, and Gracious! When I walk in after putting in diesel in the van, I approach the cashier with a blank look on my face, and say "Bonjour!" I hand them my credit card and point to the Camper and utter a french number (each pump is numbered). Bugger, I thought to myself once....what is SIXTEEN in french? I had visions of my french teacher back in SA, a disgusted look on his face. Anyway...I point the cashier to the camper, and they utter something in French, take my card, and utter some more french at me...to which I smile and wave my hand , indicating that "Yes I know my SA card needs to me to sign in pen whereas normal people dont need to"...and I wait for them to find a pen, just for me... I sign the slip and smile again, saying Avoir!..while walking out. This has been the extent of my communications with French locals thus far. I did try and be fearless, and walk up to a pancake vendor, but chickened out when I couldnt find a way to say..."please put icecream on the pancake please". There was a crowd, and I wasnt going to stick my head out :) Buying Baquettes is a lot easier...I walked into a shop and pointed at a basket of breadstuffs. The guy looked at me and pointed at the small oval breads. I spread my arms wide and made a funny gesture, and got handed a wierd roll. I bought it. Wasnt a baguette. Havent a clue what it actually is called :)
I made up a cool song which we now sing wholeheartedly when we feel like it. It goes like this..."Put your baquette in a packette...clap you hands..... put your baquette in a packet , clap your hands......put your baqueete in a packet, and dont forget to stack it....put your baqueet in a packet clap your HANDS!!!!!!!!!

OK, I have now lost the plot of this blog. officially. How to end off...hmmmm..... I guess I should describe my daily chore of finding an Internet connection with which to download all my business mails and send off new responses. In the small french village we are in right now (30mins from St Tropez) I finally found a hotel, situated along a small french coastal road, behind some potholes, and ferns. I let the car idle till the nose reaches the hotel entrance, and switch off, while rolling the van slowly forward, undetected...nearer and nearer the wireless "zone". Aha!, the laptop shows it has found the little wireless signal, to which our lives hand by a thread these days... I quickly enter the login codes and cònnect, and download the hundreds of mails we get, from Viagra salesmen, to Italian watch manufacturers, to a few normal mails sent to us by our SA clients, asking for silly things like why they are receiving Viagra emails. I peer wide-eyed at the hotel, expecting some burly french doorman to walk out at any minute and ask me to move the huge lump of camper from their beautifully landscaped gateway. I quickly tap responses to some mails, and send them off, and disconnect from the network, start the van, and idle off down the hill.....a sigh of relief....all is well with the world. I smile, thinking how wonderful email is...how you wouldnt know if I wrote this blog sitting on the toilet, or parked next to a french beach. Wireless internet is definately the way to go if you want to live and work on the move. Did I mention that M already has a list of things for me to fix on the house when back in SA. TYPICAL WOMAN!

NEWS UPDATE - 18th November.
Instead of travelling towards Nice and Italy, we reversed our steps and travelled back towards Toulon and after some searching, have found a fantastic little beach haven Marina town with a strange name of "Six-Fours Les Plages". AND we have free camper parking behind the tourist office AND free internet parked 20m from a circle outside a French block of flats. This is where we are currently sitting at 9:10pm at night after making a quick dash here when we realised that Marielle had forgotten to follow up on a client query. Such is business on the road!
Tomorrow we hope the weather is good and hope to spend a few days walking around this idealic location.
Toulon - Nimes - Avignon - Carpentras - Grenoble - Chambery - Annecy - Charmonix-Mont-Blanc - Lugano (Switzerland) - Lake Como (Italy) - Basel (North Switzerland) - Stassbourg - Luxembourg ?????? THAT'S OUR NEW PLAN.
:) Dean.


MARIELLE'S UPDATE - 18th November.
I miss my hot bath already!!!!! I want to go back Jean-Luc and Christine's holiday home in La Croix Valmer !!!Dean is just popped outside the van to blow cold smoke rings for Tanner. It's kinda chilly here!

The Devil lives in Zurich

After leaving the beautiful, peaceful, free internet zone in Luzerne, we
headed towars Zurich at about 11am today with a one hour drive ahead of us.
Here I sit at 6:30pm with utter hatred for this city! We arrived in Zurich
and put in the GPS a Train Station looking for an internet hotspot. We
were told by Swisscom there are LOTS of these in Zurich!The GPS took us to a platform in a Zurich suburb with not even a railway
office on which to fasten a wireless hotspot beacon! So after re-
programming our beloved GPS we headed into the belly of the beast - the
C.B.D. of Zurich in search of a wifi zone. We found one quite easily BUT
no parking as far as the eye can see. Soooo your's truly jumps out the
van, walks down the street holding the laptop in the air trying to get a
signal. I am happy to report that I was successful but only when standing
at the very street corner looking like a cyber hooker!
We then programmed the GPS to find the nearest Tourist Office. You have to
picture the roads in Zurich. They are mostly all one-way, with no lane
markings and tram lines EVERYWHERE! We even ended up on a dual tram
carriageway where cars are disallowed and the people in the back seat of
the tram in front of us all waving madly and pointing us to a small road
where we could escape.
I had mentioned in my previous blog that people in Luzerne looked at us as
if they had never seen a camper van WELL Zurich is not any better and they
openely stare rudely making us mutter obscenities under our breath at these
people.
Finally, at 4:45pm we found the Tourist Info. Let me interrupt right now
and say.... that Jane (our GPS voiceover) says it was 7 minutes to your
destination!!! Dean stopped the van, on a slight widening of a main road
but where we thought it would be okay. I ran into the Tourist Info, stood
in a line, came face to face with a not very motivated lady. She circles
two areas on the map that have free Wifi. Yay I think, although already
knowing what lay ahead in trying to find this wifi hotspot.
I ran out to the van, expecting to see Dean but no Dean in sight. My first
thought was, "how long is it going to be before he gets back to me". I
could do nothing but wait. In my haste to leave the van, I had not put on
a very warm jacket so needless to say I was quite cold!
Thank goodness Dean wasn't too long in coming around. Now here is an
insert from Dean:
M had gone into the Tourist info centre leaving me parked on a busy Swiss
main road. Across from where we were parked, I noticed a McDonalds and
previous experience in Luzerne had shown me the name of the mcDonalds
wireless Network which I found by carefully balancing the laptop in the
passenger seat trying not to make things too obvious as where the van was
parked wasn't the best. I had a flicker on making it look as though I was
ready to pull out into the traffic at a moments notice. I managed to get
to the McDonalds login page which is a simple matter of clicking a button
and having 30 minutes of internet access, just enough for me to download
mail while waiting for Marielle. I clicked the login button the page and
my browser flashed to an error message, meaning I had lost the signal to
their hotspot. The only thing to do was balance the laptop on one hand
while trying to hit the backbutton with the other and pointing it in the
direction over the busy road while screaming at the kids to sit down and
stop rocking the van suspension at such a precarious moment. Something our
3 year old has not yet fully learned to understand.
It was a this crucial balancing act moment, where I felt 2 pairs of eyes
boring into the right hand side of my South African face and with extreme
concentration on my face, I lifted my chin to look outside Marielle's
passenger door window to find the bewildered and astonished facial
expressions of 2 Swiss Policemen peering across the cement barrierinto the
van. Knowing there was hardly any explanation for the balancing act, I
gently placed the laptop on M's seat, waived at them, and sped off -
thinking I wonder if I will ever see my wife again. At least I had Jane's
beautiful voices to listen to as she gently guided me back through the
Swiss traffic. Back to M now...
I was so relieved to see Dean when he came round the corner but he had the
pedestrians very confused. He saw me so promptly slowed down although the
robot was still green for him. The people waiting to cross the pedestrian
crossing were wondering what on earth he was doing.
We then started looking for the two wifi hotspots that the not-so-happy
tourist lady had circled on our map. To cut a very long story short, we
never found them so eventually after hours of driving headed for the same
one we had found before where it was Dean's turn to jump out the van, walk
to the street corner and download his mail leaving me in the van to cook
some supper BUT of course, after about 15 minutes of being parked (for the
very first time since 11am this morning), someone has the cheek to knock on
our van door and tell us to move.!!!
During the entire course of the day, I have moaned and groaned about this
city but Dean has said, all cities are the same, but we will still enjoy
this one when we walk around...
After the very rude person knocked on the door, Dean jumps in the van and
says, WE ARE LEAVING THIS PLACE!!! I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!!!
We have now bade a very happy farewell to Zurich, have already encountered
major traffic out the city but are finally on a freeway heading towards
Bern where once again Swisscom says "Yes, there are plenty of wireless
networks".If this blog is updated by tomorrow afternoon, then you will know he was
right!
We have nowhere to sleep yet but Jetan has falled asleep and we hope to
find a place soon. I must admit, I can't wait to get back to the U.K.
where everyone speak English and it doesn't cost me R36.00 for about 350g
of mince meat!

Roast, Ralf, Railway Stations, Rain and Rolling Countryside

Roast, Ralf, Railway Stations, Rain and Rolling Countryside
Well I promised this blog to be published a lot quicker than the last so here goes...
Regarding the subject heading of the blog.... It basically sums up ourlast few days in Switzerland except for the Roast
part, so I'll get that out the way now.
Firstly the ROAST... This part is for my two buddies in Joburg who get to pick up us gypsies from the airport. Am I allowed
to put in my request for the following now? Roast Meat (not fussy which one - however after seeing the cute cows with bells
around their necks in Switzerland, I think I'd feel guilty eating Beef :), then roast potatoes, cauliflower and cheese,
butternut, peas and lots of gravy (nothing boiled or fried). Is that a tall order or what? I don't even mind cooking it,
just as long as I have a bigger space than 1,5 meter squared to cook it in :)
Well 3 days ago we headed towards Switzerland. Once again an unplanned part of our trip as it took place sooner than later.
We left France at about 11am on Friday with a relatively short distance to drive (1.5 hrs), can you believe that's how far we
were from Switzerland. Well the drive turned out to be much longer because we had to stop to find out how we could get
internet access in Switzerland. Our original plan was to use Annecy (France) as a base, go to Switzerland on
Fridayafternoon, spend the weekend there and come back Sunday afternoon so that we could work again on the Monday. Then re-
do this trip on Friday afternoon again.
On reaching Switzerland, we drove into Geneva where Dean parked the van. I was to venture into the town in search of the
Tourist Information. Well I never quite got there because I saw an ORANGE shop. This is the wireless internet provider that
we were using in France. I went into the shop where I was second in the queue. Well an hour later and after 2 people behind
me were rude enough to jump the queue,I was still standing in the queue having got nowhere because ORANGE don't offer
wireless internet in Switzerland. Instead I was to approach Swisscom. I left the shop and turned around in every direction
and couldn't remember where the van was. For a few minutes, I panicked. I couldn't even think of a landmark where the van
was. Anyway I eventually found my way back to a hopeful looking Dean but I had no good news to tell him.
Our journey continued, until I eventually found a Swisscom. Dean parked the van and I ran in. Much more organised with about
9 people to help and you took a number from a machine and the number was called out. Aaagh success at last at a price. 50
Swiss Frans for 135 minutes of internet airtime. VERY expensive BUT it enables us to stay on in Switerland and not have to
drive back to France. So if you're not hearing often from us, it's because we quickly download mail, disconnect, type
responses and re-connect. Of course we constantly have to watch the battery power on the pc and van as well.
So off we headed to Interlaken. We remembered going there years ago and loving it. Well the Swiss, although much friendlier
than the French, definitely do NOT want campervans in their town. The first night we arrived we drove around for 3.5 hrs
looking for a parking that allowed overnight camping. We eventually found one but made sure that we left early in the
morning.The next day we decided to go up to the top of the Jungfrau mountain so that we could see snow. The trip us was really fun.
It took 2,5 hrs either way. The beautiful little Swiss Chalets on the way up are simply gorgeous as well as all the cows
that just seem to appear everywhere. On reaching the top, we walked through what is called the "The Ice Palace". It
consisted of walls of ice and ice sculptures. Of course Tanner, decides it's an ice-skating rink and goes flying and because
he is such a role model to B.O.J. No. 3 (Bundle of Joy), Jetan decides to try the same thing and lands flat on his bum and in
tears! Have I mentioned how cold we were at this point? Jesse was already complainingFinally we made it to the doors that led to the snow - and we stopped! Deciding that we need every bit of available material
that we have, to cover us. By now we had already lost one beanie hat so that left one of us without a hat. So we had to
take it in turns to go out. First it was Dean and Tanner. They came in with noses streaming and eyes running but with huge
grins on their faces. Oh yes, not just a grin on Tanner's face but also a huge bruise we he had falled on the ice. I have
been told that he sobbed his little heart out when this happened.Next it was my turn. Off I went armed with my camera. Scarf on, gloves on... Did I mention how cold it was????? The wind
was very strong, I could barely stand up straight. The ice was also very slippery but instead of being concerned about my
rear end maybe taking a fall, I had to protect the camera hanging around my neck BUT even through all of this it was
definitely a memorable experience. I started to make my way down and met with a snowball - my other half thought it was a
good idea to send one my way. I would have loved to have retailiated but there was no way I was even bending down in case my
face met the ice.On coming back in, Jesse was feeling even more nauseous and I started feeling really lightheaded. Oh yes I never actually
got onto the next part of my subject heading.RALF - have you heard of saying "Hello to Raaalf" Well that's Jesse. On reaching the snowtop doors, he had to find the first
available bin to puke into, after that it was a packet. I then found myself running to the nearest place I could to get a
packet. The run was not far - maybe 200m but by the time I turned around to come back I was absolutely out of breath. At
that altitude and in the cold it is just so difficult to breathe. I am sure that this was so much worse for Jesse but we
hadn't thought . In fact when I was running back there was a lady passed out on the ground and she was been given oxygen.Jesse finally ventured into the snow and loved it but wasn't there too long. We never took Jetan out because of the ice
being so slippery.We decided we needed warming up so made out way to the restaurant. Why I bother to make packed lunches I just don't know!!!We landed up ordering a huge plate of chips and a huge plate of spaghetti bolognaise - 7 Franks and 17 Franks - That comes
to about R130.00 but we felt so much better afterwards. It actually took about an hour or so for all of us to feel normal.Dean and Tanner went out again while I sat behind with Jesse, who was by now lying sprawled on the floor under the table,
still puking into a bag (yup in a restaurant) and Jetan who was absolutely impossible. Now for those of you have read my
London Blog, I have to ask - Why do I always get stuck with the puking child. It was not looking promising for our trip
home. At 3:45pm we caught the train back. It was so funny to see EVERYONE on the train sleeping. Everyone was absolutely
exhausted. The trip up and down required us to board 3 different trains each way. Very tiring with 3 kids.On the second to last train back, Jetan desperately needed a nappy change. I had wanted to go to the toilet to change him
but couldn't for fear of missing the connecting train. So yup, you guessed it, he had to be changed on the train. So there
we have it - Puke and Crap!!! Fun being a parent isn't it?On the very last train home Jesse and I sat opposite a man in his mid 40's. He was very quiet until Jesse starting puking
again (By now we're on our 4th bag). Well now he thought he could converse with us. No matter how many times we said to him
we don't speak German, he decided to talk. He talked the entire trip. It drove me nuts. I was only too glad to leave the
train.That night we found another sleeping spot between a main road that runs along the mountain and a lake. There were no lights
at all, so when we eventually turned ours off, it was pitch black. This spot was good for us because we could run the
generator and no-one could hear.The next day we took a walk around the town, and had to visit a laundromat. Whilst parked, a gentleman came and told Dean
where he could park for the night. It was about a minute away behind a building, next to a running river. The river was so
loud that no-one could hear the generator running so it was perfect.
Well that brings us to Yesterday and to RAIN and ROLLING Country side. We decided that we needed to head towards Luzerne,
which is further North. Well it rained the entire way but to make matters worse the trip took us up along the windy curving
roads of the mountain. I was a nervous wreck the entire way. Although beautiful, it was a very scary trip. I think both
Dean and I barely breathed the entire way.
And finally RAILWAY STATIONS. Since being overseas, these seem to be our local hangout because of the internet. I now hate
Railway Stations and never want to go near them again. Everyone is in a hurry!Today we didn't have to go because we found FREEEEEE Internet. The only problem is that it is at a parking lot which is very
expensive to park out. So Dean just keeps the engine running in case we have to make a quick getaway. It is a park where
old people walk their dogs and I am sure that judging by the looks on their faces that they think a camper van comes from
outerspace.
Well that is now us all up to date. We have walked around the Old City of Luzerne today and are heading for Munich tomorrow
where we hope to visit the Lindt Chocolate Factory.
xxx Marielle and all the guys.

France Blog

Hello Hello. Are we in trouble or what? Have had a few people ask - WHEN are you going to blog? So sorry, time has just passed by so quickly.
At this moment in time I have no idea where we last left off in our blog and I don't have an internet connection right now so I can't check so I am going to go back as far as I can remember and that's to Bournemouth, our last stop before leaving the U.K.For those of you who don't know, we found a church to visit called Wessex Christian Centre. Went to both morning and evening service and really loved it. A lovely couple (ex South Africans) invited us to dinner on the Monday night. It was really nice to not have to sit in a "box"and eat supper. We thoroughly enjoyed their company and plan on visiting them in a few weeks time.
We then made our way to Dover to catch the ferry to Calais. This ferry cost us a third of the price of when we first caught the ferry from Calais to Dover. Why, I just don't know. It was the same shipping line just a different time that we sailed. The first trip was done at midnight which we were told was the cheapest! This time round we caught the ferry at 4:30pm.
We arrived in Calais, originally planning to have driven straight to Paris, Eurodisney but we discovered that the drive was about 2 more hours than we thought so we decided to find a place to camp for the night. We camped next to a small river quite near the port. The next morning, Dean realised that his credit car was missing. So off we went back to the petrol station that we had been to the night before where for the first time I had to speak French to someone - Either my French is really bad or he just chose to not listen to me. I tried in every way possible to explain that my husband had lost his credit card, showed him mine so he knew what I was saying, but to no avail. He eventually called his assistant, who was not their the night before, and I explained to her. She understood me, opened the draw and there was Dean's card. Well did we breathe a sigh of relief.Dean informs me, that he was in absolute awe of the French babe the night before who he paid for the petrol so that's why he forgot his card.HELLO Dean, I'm a French babe, I had to remind him!Anyway thank goodness we had made the decision to not drive to Paris the night before as we would not have been able to get the card back.
That morning we began our trip to Paris. It was a long drive with us eventually finding the Aire that we found in the Camperstop book. It was just a parking at a petrol garage but we were quite happy to park and not pay anything.
The next day we headed towards Eurodisney. 13 Euros we discovered, is what we had to pay to park and sleep over but this did not include electricity. Well after all we had spent on the Eurodisney tickets this seemed like a drop in the Ocean.
To cut a very long story short about Eurodisney or Mickey "House" land as Jetan calls it..... It was just fun all the way. Very exciting for the kids. Very tiring as well. They were like bulls in a china shop. We barely ate for 4 days and that's no lie. We had cereal in the morning, left the van at about 10am (that's when the park opens), then it is about a 1.5km walk to the gates and then of course we walked the entire day until 10pm the first night and 7pm for the 3 nights after that and then we had to walk back at the end of the day. Thank goodness, during part of the way, there are those flat escalators that you can just stand on BUT NOOOO not my boys, they think it's fun to run along the one going in the opposite direction!
After the 1st day at Eurodisney, we decided to go into Paris to see the Eiffel Tower (good tourists that we are). Well it only took 35 minutes to get there, we found a parking easily right under the tower. Were told by one of the locals that it should be okay to park as it was a Sunday (never mind it was the coach bus parking) however there wasn't one coach in site.
So off we went, to discover that going up the tower was just too expensive so decided the walk under was just as good. After about an hour we see in the distance a couple of coaches, well did Dean run or what. By the time we got back to our van there were about 4 coaches waiting to park. Thank goodness we did not get a ticket. Enough of this we thought and headed back for the short drive back to the park. Well that was wishful thinking. It took 3,5 hrs to get back. I have discovered that Paris streets are worse than London streets. The French just do not believe in obeying traffic lights and the traffic cops (no matter how cute they are :) are just no help either. Dean and I can definitely say that we have seen the street life of Paris.
The next day we pounded the Walt Disney Park Studios pavements, had lots of fun. On the 3rd day, Dean had an idea. I must take Jesse and Tanner into the park for the day. He will go and sit at the one hotel and check mail and clean up the van and keep Jetan. Although I hated being apart from him, I decided to go with the plan. At 2pm, Dean did meet us and brought us sandwiches to eat. The food at Eurodisney is just so expensive. A hotdog costs 4 Euros 70. There was just no way we could buy anything let alone any souvenirs. Well I was exhausted by the end of the day. Jesse and Tanner insisted on staying to the very last minute to watch the same end of evening celebration that they had already watched twice...When I got back to the van, Dean was doing his nut with Jetan. Jetan hadn't slept all day and had talked all day long.
The next day, sly Dean that he is, says okay it's his turn to go into the park (I knew this was coming) but I landed up having all 3 boys in the van for hours. Did I get the raw end of the deal or what!!!!
Leaving Eurodisney was bitter sweet to say the least.
Now that we had left the "safe haven"of Eurodisney where Dean at least knew he could connect to the internet, we decided it was time to venture into France. Both of us very nervous, him because of work and me because I knew the pressure was on to communicate.
We headed towards Beaune. For no particular reason except that it was on route to Lyon and then to Marseille. Well we landed up spending about 4 nights at the parking lot. We had electricity if we needed it and paid for it, and the wireless signal that Dean was receiving was the hotel next door so he didn't even have to leave the van to connect.
While going to the laundromat one day, I met a lady and we got chatting. Thank goodness in English. I told her we were staying in a camper van etc... A few hours later, she came to invite us to watch the Rugby Final. Now how could us patriotic South Africans say no to that!!! It was so nice to be warm, as we had been going through a very cold spell with the wind being really cold. I think I've sent most of you photos showing us all bundled up.
Our stay in Beane enabled us to recharge our energy batteries a bit. It was also so nice not to have to pay to stay somewhere each night. The night before we left, Tanner, bumped his tooth (he had injured himself a few days before while him and Jesse were kickboxing in a supermarket!). The poor little guy was really sore and the blood was gushing out. This left Dean and I in a predicament as the tooth that is currently hanging loose is not coming out naturally with a tooth behind it. It is actually bruised and hanging on. Now, our travel policy says that only in the event of an emergency can we claim back from them if we take him to the dentist but even to do this we have to pay the first R2000.00 and we can't claim that back. The next morning we had to make the decision whether or not to take him to the dentist. Tanner assured us that he was okay. We were nervous to not take him because we had already reported this event to the emergency helpline which means that if he now has a problem, days later, they most definitely won't cover his expenses. So the question I ask is:NOW WHY CAN'T THESE KIDS JUST HOLD ONTO THE JOLLY TROLLY WHEN WE SHOP!
We eventually left and made our way to another stop - Bourge-en-brasse. Found a place to stay, parked next to a beautiful church. Dean decided to leave at about 6am that morning and drive while the kids were sleeping. Good move!
We arrived in a place called Annecy. Now for those of you who are really good in Georgraphy or bother to actually look where Annecy is, it's not en-route to Marseille! Change of Plans again! We have decided to make our way to Switzerland for the weekend. We spent a good part of today looking for a place to sleep and looking for a hotel that had a wifi signal for Dean. We have found both and what must be one of the most beautiful places I have been. We are still in France but we are only 30 minutes from Switzerland and this part of France definitely has the flavours of Switzerland. I even saw a cow with a bell around it's neck early this morning. For those of you who know me, this is the one thing I wanted to see in Switzerland so I can't wait to see a whole bunch of cows! We will then come back to Annecy on Sunday night and spend the weekend here and then back to Switzerland next weekend.
The wifi hotspot is about a 3 minute walk from where we are camped so that's good for us. We spent the later part of this afternoon sitting near a lake (we are parked directly opposite from it) while the kids rode their bikes/scooters. Tanner, my crazy son, decided it would be fun to walk in the water. I don't know how he did it, it was freezing. I had my feet in for about 10 seconds and they cramped up.
It is now 9pm and Dean left the van about an hour ago to walk around the town. Jesse and Tanner are still awake and it's time for me to log off this computer because it is plugged into the campervan inverter at the moment. Oh here comes Dean and he is complaining that it is too hot in the van. I have only just switched off the gas heater.
Bye for now. I'm sure Dean will have a few things to say...

Latest update from Dean....
Hello everybody, sorry I haven't blogged but M has beaten me to it a few times. Personally I think Annecy has to be on par with the fjords of Norway in beauty. Clear crystal water lapping from the lake and mountains. In Paris, we decided to buy a generator for the camper. Unlike the U.K. where we were staying at C.L's (Farmer's land) with 220 volts to plug in, France is the complete opposite and finding power to charge the leisure battery of the van is a real challenge. So besides finding a tap to refill the camper water supplies on a daily basis, the responsibility has fallen on me to make sure that the pump which pumps the water for Marielle's shower NEVER should die at the most inconvenient moment. An error which would be held against me for the rest of my life. I therefore find myself filling up so-called generator on a daily basis with the french favourite unleaded petrol mixed with 2% generator oil sourced from a French"hypermarket"after peering at a bottle with french instructions on it for over 20 minutes. For all I know, I could be putting a mixture of rasberry juice syrup into the favourable generator for charging pump for showers for the queen. Please pray! If it sounds like I don't know what the hell I am doing, you have no idea! As it is, I haven't quite figured out how the "Queen"can use her hairdryer or hair straightener yet. Upon connecting the generator to the van, I found that a french generator plug does not suit a dutch van and went desperately in search for that little piece of cable that the camper dealer had given to me which I had stashed 4 months ago in the gas cylinder compartment.
Oh ja!!!! Since our little van has now travelled between continents and over 8000 Kms, it is important to share this piece of advice with future travellers. In Holland, they provide you with beige gas cylinders with Type A hose plugs which do not work when refilling gas in the U.K, where we were lucky enough to be lent a 15K bottle by friends. I then stored the old Dutch bottles alongside the new larger U.K. bottle which we then used while travelling around the U.K and on entering France.However, as "Queen"was having her daily shower powered by above-mentioned pump and generator the steam which normally is associated with the hot water powered by English gas abruptly began to disapate leading to screams of "where is the hot water? (expetives deleted)". I rushed to check what could be tweaked in this moment of despair, only to find that we were running out of U.K. gas and had no French gas to replace it, which led to an urgent visit to a gas shop the next morning. After much searching and stressful map reading (GPS did not know where the gas shope was and kept on taking us down a narrow cobbled street), I finally ditched M and the kids parked on the side of the road and sprinted to the shop reaching the shop at 11:59am (Please note all shops close at 12 each day in France). I walked into the shop and said "Do you speak English"and was met with the official "NO!". "Bonjour" I said while holding up my U.K. gas cylinder fitting. "Propane"he asked, shaking his head. In my best hand signalled French I explain to him that I needed a Butane Gas cylinder fitting to stick on the newly acquired french bottle for heating for water for "Queen"now sitting in van with glum look on face.
Well it's now 2 days later and Dean never got to finish his update but I think it's time we upload this blog otherwise we'll be back in S.A. before we do it.
We have tons more to write of events in the last 2 days but that will come in another blog.

Squires update - Up to 4th October 2007.

Oh my goodness, I have just seen that the last time we blogged was on the 23rd September, well between then and now I can't remember all the details of what we did and where we were, so can't really fill you in - sorry :) Dean asked me what day of the week it was yesterday and I didn't have a clue. I had to check the calender on my cellphone!

Last week we were in Halwell (Devon). Well being there was really great as we were the only ones besides one other caravaner.
The field was huge so the kids could play and make as much noise as they wanted. Of course, that's when they were outside!!! which was NOT much because of the jolly rain. While there we visited Torquay and Dartmouth. Visiting Torquay involved us crossing over on a ferry. This was quite nice as we could just drive on, stay in the car and it literally took 5 minutes.
This is the only way we could get across to Torquay. Dartmouth was gorgeous. Absolutely NO parking so we found a Park and Ride (they have quite a lot of these) where you pay and and park but then there is a bus that takes you into the town and you catch the bus back to he parking at any time. Now Dean and I could live in Dartmouth. Such a quaint little town with so
many houses along the bay, some of them even have their own mooring stations. Just like we would have garages, well THEY park their boats. A little bit of envy did most definitely set in. After a long day in Dartmouth and with Jetan offering many tearful moments, just to test us, we finally made our way back to the park and ride bus to discover that the van is running out of gas. Now at home, if this happened and I couldn't cook, it wouldn't be too bad, cause and AFFORDABLE KFC or Spur is down the road and our bath is not run on gas but in our little van it presents a bit of a problem. Well with some kind of tea (which is actually supper in the U.K.) taken care of, and bathing in I don't know HOW many litres of kettle boiled water, we finally
drifted off to dreamland.

We spent 5 nights at this site, it was so nice to know we had a home at the end of the day and not have to try and find one.
2 nights ago was another story! We decided to save a bit of money and find somewhere to sleep that did not require us to part with 8 - 10 pounds. So we headed to Poole (which is near Bournemouth) and relocated to the Car Ferrry Terminal for the night. We didn't look conspicuous at all, as there were people waiting to board the ferry in the morning. Met a lovely
elderly couple who are leaving the U.K. after living their lives here and moving to Brittany, France. Well did we Oooh and aaah! Learnt a few secrets from them, like parking in a hospital parking for free! Mmmmmm one we haven't tried yet.

They were catching the ferry in the morning but had not realised that because of the Foot and Mouth disease in the U.K., that they were not allowed to take any milk or meat products (even tinned) to France so they were going to bin it all, but they blessed us with what they had. What was even more of a blessing is that we had intended to do quite a shop before we left
the U.K. on our way to France and we would have spent money for nothing as we would not have known. So this was a double-blessing for us. Now when we were still in S.A. I said that I wanted stories like THESE to tell so I'm glad that this one came about HOWEVER the story of Jetan keeping us up the entire night that night is not one I want to tell. The night before he had been rubbing his ears but no other symptoms. Then during the course of the day his nose started streaming. Well that night, he woke up crying and crying, there was just no way to console him. We were also kept awake by the Camper owners that arrived and decided to have a bit of a party outside our caravan BUT the ferry terminal had another advantage. The toilets
were spotless and there were even showers that were heated. Now that was a bonus! AND we didn't have to pay for them.

Yesterday, we decided to not travel far and only made our way about 45 minutes further to Ringwood (near the New Forest area, where we were over a month ago). This area is really stunning and I am happy to be back. We were exhausted when we arrived here yesterday and didn't do much except go do Laundry. I wanted to wash all the bedding. Made our way to the laundromat, where we met a lady who gave us an instant offer for the van, unfortunately it was about 2000 pounds less than we want for it BUT she didn't close her offer at all and we have her number, so we'll give her a call in a few months time.

The site we are at is opposite a forest. Unfortunately the forest is playing havoc with out internet connection so I guess we'll be driving shortly - ha ha. It's 9:32am S.A. time and only Jetan and I are awake! . Oh did I mention that Jetan woke up many times last night and now he is coughing really badly. The only way to calm him down was to sing to him.He was absolutely fine yesterday. The weather was gorgeous with NO wind. Having no wind is stunning. The boys played outside and we cooked outside. The cold is always fine (not that it was cold) just as long as there is no wind.

Today we go into Bournemouth (very big city) to do a bit of hardware shopping. There are some things we would like to do on the van before we head off to France next Wednesday. Yup, that is the date, and hopefully it won't change! Our very big problem is the internet in Europe and all the campsites close at the latest the end of October, so it means finding Aires to stay at (these are designated areas for camper vans that have electricity points but no-one manns them BUT they are not expensive) BUT we need to find wireless internet. We are extremely nervous about this part of our trip. There are so many places we want to visit, like Switzerland, Austria etc... but this hinges on our internet availability. Had we planned our trip a bit more cleverly, we should have done that part of the trip first but we wanted to be in those areas when the cold
got too much in the U.K. which will probably be in about a month's time here. Our van is really warm, but showering is already feeling a bit cold. Time to start taking all the vitamins that I lugged over from S.A to keep us flu free.

Anyway that's all I can think of right now. Please bear us up in prayer regarding illness. Tanner is also sounding fluish but he is really such a trooper and just plods on.

Will try and update the blog sooner than later :)

Change of Plans - AGAIN!

Hello everyone, sorry about the long wait in new info. As usual plans changed - AGAIN! The last time we blogged we were waiting in Porthcawl for the Festival of Wales to take place in the town centre. We arrived in Porthcawl on the Tuesday and the event was due to take place as from the Thursday - well typical Squires, by the Thursday we had had enough of Porthcawl
and the weather so decided to leave on the Thursday. Now about the weather. We were parked next to a beach and an amusement park that while walking around it (left guys in the van), I felt like I was on an abandoned movie set. It was quite eerie.
The only sounds I could hear was of one or two shops that were open with arcade games in them. Okay back to the weather.

For the two nights we "free camped"to save money - ha ha - (we drove around so long looking for a spot to camp I don't think we saved money at all!) the wind was so strong that it literally felt like we were on a boat rocking back and forth. On the first night I actually got up to check that we didn't have water swirling around us, that's how bad it was! Also to put the
cherry on the top, because there was so much wind (and I mean it was hectic!), when we put the boiler on to heat up water for the shower), the wind would constantly blow out the flame which lies in a panel on the outside of the van SOOOOOO no hot water. Do you know, it is possible to shower/bath in 2 kettles of hot water????? Yup, army here I come, I can cope with
anything :)Finding water was also a problem. In S.A. we would simply have just driven up to a garage (here they are called "Services:) and turned on a tap to get water. NOT in Wales, you either pay for water or the taps are all turned off. We drove around for about an hour looking for water, eventually Dean drove to a Garage and asked 2 ladies that worked in the onfectionary in the garage if we could use a tap from behind their serving hatch/pie machine. Yes they said! BUT their eyes just about popped out of their sockets when Dean arrived with 2 x 25 litre containers. Anyway we got our water and off we went.

Within 2 hours we were out of Wales, back in England and made our way to the Somerset District. We thought we'd get Jesse invovled in the decision as to where to sleep for the night. He did his homework and found a place in Polchem (heard of it?????, neither had we!). We even let him set the TomTom (GPS) so that we could be on our way. Now you're thinking!!!! Was
that a good idea!!!! Well we didn't think but trusted our 12 year old whole heartedly!!!! Did you know that England has the most fascinating 2m wide country roads which maze through hundreds of acres of green hedges, all of which lead to tiny stone-henge looking villages, none of which contain a petrol station and all of which are nowhere near Polchem. Well we discovered all these places for you, so don't feel the need to visit them. Seriously, our one hour journey took us 4 hrs and heated tempers along the way. Not all Jesse's fault, we did check the settings but the A359 and A39 roads escaped our careful scrutiny. We found that the difference between these 2 roads is a farmroad through sugarcane compared to the N3 freeway to Joburg! To cut a VERY long story short, by the time we got to our site, we were frazzled. On top of it, we got
to the site in Polchem and there was no place for us to park except snuggling up to a 22ft caravan whose inhabitants immediately tattle taled to the site owner who had to rush out in the middle of night to reshuffle everybody's power cabling so that our kids voices could be positioned at the far end of the camper/caravan line.
After a NOT very good night sleep because DEAN!!!!!! still has not bought the levellers for the van, we decided to visit Glastonbury the next day.Well what an experience which we did not enjoy. Jesse said he did not like this town - let me tell you why! In the city centre, the roads are lined by not only zombies but shops that deal with mystiscm, witchcraft, fortune-telling, crystals, etc.... After explaining to the kids that this town was from the Dark Side we walked up to the front door of the local 16th century Abby which had a plaque on the front door saying "This church is the house of God, enter in reverance and leave it not without prayer for those who minister here, those who worship, and for thyself". It was truly an island of holiness in
the centre of witchcraft. As we walked from the church grounds, a backpacker, came storming through from the street literally spitting and grunting and ran up to the big wooden doors of the church trying to barge his way in. This guy needed help.

We left and drove to a little town called Wells, about 15 minutes away. We found a little village in the town called "Wookey hole". The Wookey Hole has a theme park of Teddy Bears. You can meandre your way through a small forest into a cave area and tour the cave and hear the stories about it.Although the park was all about the Wookey Teddy Bear, it was all defintely very spiritual - not in a good way! The toilets had Witch and Wizzard written above them!
We left and drove to our next site in a place called Street. This is where we are parked right now. It is 9:38am in the morning. We currently don't have an internet connection and will upload this a bit later. Not sure if we are staying here today but are definitely enjoying the lie-in. Boys are watching The Thunderbirds at the moment.

France is coming up sooner and sooner (Devon first) but with a whole lot of unanswered questions. The internet connection is obviously a big concern for us but apart from promising the boys to take them to Eurodisney, I do want to see where my mom grew up so we need to do some planning.

Hope to hear from SOMEONE soon :)

We found life in Wales!!!!

ello ello everyone. Dean here at last. M has been doing most of the blogs lately, but I found a few moments so here I am:) In the previous posts we were saying that we couldnt find any people in Wales...all of the towns seemed deserted...quite odd. Surely we dont smell that bad already??? We had planned to visit Tenby at some stage....read a link somewhere that called it a lively little town...so we thought...."lively"....it's gotta have some people in it? AND IT DID :) It is a small Welsh town perched on a hillside that fades down with a beach on the left, and a beach on the right...and at the point, where the too beached should join, is a gigantic blob of rock, with enermous caverns carved out by the sea....absolutely brilliant.... and the beaches.....100m of clean fine sand....in a bay where the waves crashed every 3 seconds, no larger than 30cm high...idyllic...and then of course the boys arrived and shook the natural cathedral of rock, sand and waves, with.....Dad!!!!!! Its MY turn to fly the kiyyyyyttteeeeeee... I thought...God....beam me up now pleaseeeeeee?????????

We had our first truly local meal in a Tenby resturant....3 bowls of veg soup, cheese and rolls, and a tea and scones.... (can you tell we were counting every pound spent...). (I later found that M had swiped some of the tubes of sauces that were on the table...viva South Africa!)

Temby was yesterday...spent the night in a CL/farm and carried on driving today towards Bridgend...where we hope to see the Festival of Wales on Thurs/Fri/Sat. In the interim though, we decided to wild camp in the van overnight (tues) to save some money, since our budget is looking very tight. We ended up driving miles looking for a place to hide for the night, and found a groovy spot next to a coal museum parking lot. A grey car was parked in the same parking lot when we arrived, but I thought nothing of it, although it was after closing time for the museum...after a while I noticed it moved to the other side of the parking, away from our van...and again I thought nothing of it....one look at our kids and I would have done the same......As darkness began to fall, I noticed the car was still there..a bit odd I thought...and by now all sorts of warning signals were going off in my head.... (Yes, I know...His small voice was by now shouting...this is not the place to spend the night...idiot)..... I carried on cleaning out the camper and noticed a packet on the floor in the middle of the parking lot...thought it was from our van, and promptly went to pick it up to throw away....had a look inside and ...um...it contained a huge box of Duratex...um ...condoms....an empty box....... it only took a minute for my fantastic powers of reason to connect the dots...we were parked in a nightime "entertainment" area.....and unless we wanted "entertaining" we should rather find somewhere else....:)

We fed the kids, put them in their beds, and drive 20mins to Porthcawl....nearer to Bridgend...on the coast....and Woaaahhhhh....brilliantt....we found a whole beachfront of parked camper vans!!!! Safety in numbers :)))) I peaked out into the darkness just now and it should be a beautiful beach in the morning.... on the map it shows blue flags on a few beaches, and they are REALLY stunning....

yes yes, you want pics...I know. Prob is we havent had time to resize them. I will try stick one up now...from an earlier adventure :)

This is where we are...

If you look at a map of Wales (for those of you who don't know - it's to the left of the U.K.) we are sitting on the very west coast of Wales. This is called the Pembokeshire Coast.
I know I'm speaking for Dean as well, but we would really love for you to take a look at a map and see where we are and enjoy this experience with us.

Where is everyone???

Well judging by the "Buzz"in Barry, I somehow don't think it's namesake could have been a very interesting person. There was NOTHING going on in Barry. On our way out, we did happen to see a lighthouse that we thought we could walk to. So we all hopped out the van and made our way down the path to a very gorgeous beach BUT unfortunately there was a huge gate that was bolted locked so we couldn't walk to the lighthouse.

We decided to leave Barry and made our way to Swansea - not much happening there either. So on we travelled to Cross Hands where we camped near an absolutely beautiful lake. It's the first time I had ever seen anyone flyfishing and it was so graceful to watch - well that is until the 3 boys ran along the bridge and proceeded to chase the fish away.

The next morning while the guys were still in dreamland, I decided to go onto the internet to see where we were supposed to be going for the day. Dean had seen a poster about a "Roman"Theme day in a little town so I wanted to see how to get there but then I discovered that it was on the Sunday not the Saturday so for the next 45 minutes or so I scoured the internet looking for something to do and I found a goldmine. An airshow in Swansea of all places! So we packed up the van and headed for Swansea Bay and we had an absolutely awesome time. For the first part of the morning the boys played on the beach and rode their bikes on the beach. The tide was far out so Dean and the boys walked way out, got some stunning photos to prove it. The first item in the airshow was a Jet. Well this absolutely blew us away, it was almost majestic to watch (hope that's an okay word to use) and the noise was deafening but we absolutely loved it. Then we took a walk along the beach promenade for quite some time and found our spot on the grass. The next event were the "Red Arrows"- these were not as noisy but they were magnificent to watch as they trailed their coloured smoke behind them. I can only imagine that to fly one of those birds must be an absolutely awesome thing to do.

Later in the afternoon we had to drive to our next stop which took us to Harverfordwest and a place to stay. Got there at about 8:30pm so we were all eager to lock down the hatches and go to sleep. We had no internet and no tv so climbed under the covers and had an early night - well we tried but with Tanner's constant chatting that was a bit difficult. The conversation got a bit tricky when Tanner asked howcome all our surnames are Squire, Dean's response was mom and dad made you so now you're all Squires. Now I'm listening to this thinking, DEAN don't go there!!!!! Tanner is quite for a few seconds and says "but D - a - d.... what did you mean when you said "You and mom made us?"... I was sleeping up in the top bunk and was sniggering to myself. His very adult answer was ...Ï'll tell you when you're 13". Chicken!!!!!!!!

This morning we decided to not go to the Roman Theme day but rather meandered our way further up the west coast of Wales. I am so glad we did this, we stopped in the harbour of Milford Haven and had our breakfast there while the boys did schoolwork, but there was nobody around. What a sleepy little town! I finally discovered where everyone was when we found a good old trusted Tesco (Our equivalent to Pick n Pay) and asked someone where a laundromat was. Now Tesco was buzzing! I was told where to go but that the laundromat would most definitely be closed today. Now I ask myself - don't people who work all week need to do their washing on a Sunday!

Anyway, although we intend on Free Camping tonight at the harbour (i.e. staying somewhere but not paying), we thought there must be something else to see so off we set. We headed towards "Broad Haven"- I must say I wasn't expecting too much but the road to get here was stunning. The roads were VERY narrow and thus VERY scary and were lined with very tall hedges, so it constantly felt like we were driving through a maze. This scenic drive led us to Broad Haven and this is where I sit right now.

We have had a lunch of Fish & Chips (yup, I know, that's not going to help the waistline at all!), and Dean has bought the boys kites. We have been waiting patiently for the rain to let up so the boys have been tackling their maths for a while but Dean has just announced that the rain has stopped and we're going to fly the kites. Unfortunately B.O.J. (Bundle Of Joy) No. 3 has fallen asleep so that leaves Dean to go fly kites and me in the van writing to you.

My blog writing has just been interrupted by Dean who says,"Bring you camera, you have to see this - there is someone riding a horse on the beach". At this moment in time, I don't know if I am more envious of the gorgeous modern camper van that has just driven out this parking lot or the freedom of riding a horse on the beach with no-one around........

Chat soon :)

Hello again to our family and friends. For those of you who have read the blog before this one, you will know how happy I was to leave London. We are now back to seeing sheep and horses as we travel and we love it but I'm jumping the gun now, so let me rewind a bit.

When we left London, we spent a night who knows where, I can't remember now but then we headed for Bedfordshire to see Gavin and Glenda. We had a lovely relaxing time, did absolutely nothing except eat and chat. Thanks Gavin and Glenda for hosting us, we had a wonderful time and were able to be rejuvinated! The boys of course also had a lovely time.

On Monday morning we left Bedford and for the next 2 nights meandered our way through Faringdon, Aylesbury and a teeny weeny place called Aust. While in Aylesbury we took a walk along one of their canals and took a few peeks into some canal boats - some of them really needed some work done on them but on the whole they look like they could be fun to live in. Much bigger than a motorhome! Aust was a little place just before reaching Wales. To get into Wales we had to cross the Severn Brige - with a toll charge of 5 pounds 10p.

Today, we took a walk around Carphaelly town centre and had our lunch sitting in a park opposite an absolutely beautiful castle. Besides the Cliffs of Dover and The Lake District, this was one of the most beautiful places we have sat and had some lunch. Afterwards we decided to walk around the town a bit and came across a costume shop. WOW! I wish they had one of these in Durban. I would spend hours in it. The owner allowed me to try on two wigs - one a redhead and the other blonde - well I must say that being a brunette definitely suits me better and all the boys agreed. I would have loved to have bought something to bring home but it was rather costly, but as I was leaving the owner did give me a pair of Playboy bunny ears - which Dean was quite chuffed about - ha ha!!!

We have been driving for a while now and have entered an area called Barry but we are a bit lost. We told the farmer we'd be there by 7pm. Well it's 7pm on the dot now so we're late! We are stopping at a Pizza Hut to ask directions (wish we were buying pizza)!

ok...Dean taking over this post. M is in the pizza place asking for directions. Watch this space:)

London - Love it or Hate it!

Today is Wednesday and we have reached the end of our 3 days pounding the streets of London - Yay!!!! While I was so excited to come here, it has really been exhausting. Anyway back to last weekend.
We visited Adrian and Wanda and spent a lovely weekend with them. Of course Jesse was absolutely thrilled to see Warwick.
Adrian and Wanda took us to a Lebanese Restaurant where we had a stunning lunch. We even took photos of it! On Sunday we visited Knebworth Castle. We never actually went into the castle but the gardens are really stunning. The Castle was hosting a Jousting event which was lots of fun to watch.
At about 3:30pm, we left Knebworth and made our way towards London to an area called Crystal Palace. We had booked in to the campsite for 4 nights eagerly anticipating our London visit.
On Monday morning, the Squire eager beavers got ready with a pram full of Jackets (never really needed them much) and our all day bus/underground train ticket and headed off to Picadilly Circus. We had planned to jump on a tube during the course of the day to visit various places HOWEVER Monday was the first day of tube strikes and it has continued thus far. Very
annoying BUT at least lots of walking was done. In fact I don't know how the boys actually coped cause by the end of each day my legs have been really sore.
To cut a long story short, we have not really visited any place in particular but have rather just walked from one tourist attraction to another. On Monday we took the kids to Hamleys (The huge toy store), they had lots of fun. We walked around Picadilly Circus, Trafalgar Squire, The London eye. On Tuesday we went to visit the British Museum - (this had no entry fee
- whoopee!!) this was very interesting and we could have spent the whole day there but I don't think the kids would have been too happy to do that. We also made our way to Buckingham Palace along The Mall. We took a turn around Harrods - Only for the rich and famous I tell yoU!!Today was a bit unorganised. We had planned to go back to Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guard but we didn't make it in time. We decided to head towards Madame Tussauds. We were horrified at the cost but fortunately I had 2 tickets which allowed a free entry for each paying person. So instead of 4 tickets we only paid for 2. BUT it cost enough!!!!So that was basically it besides spending an obscene fortune on food - gulp!!!!!
Monday and Tuesday night we only arrived home at about 10pm or so, the kids were absolutely finished. The bus ride in and out was almost an hour each way so that contributed to the added hours. Of course with barely any tubes running, the buses and traffic was horrendous.
TONIGHT was a bus ride from hell!!! We left London at about 7:30pm, Dean and Tanner headed to the top of the bus while I stayed downstairs with Jesse and Jetan. Jetan was in top form and absolutely refused to sit down. Jesse on the other hand was feeling really nauseous. He first started off sitting behind me, then landed up on the floor in front of me with his
head on my lap, he then moved a bit further back in the bus. It was after about 10 minutes that I discovered to my horror that he had falled asleep lying across 2 chairs - IN A FULL BUS! I had to deposit Jetan on a chair and go and wake him up.
Had I known what was in store for me I would have left him sleeping! I then put him in my chair and stood next to Jetan when he promptly tells me he needs to throw up. I grab the packet out my pocket (for this intended purpose as he hadn't been feeling well before we bordered the bus) and hand it to him. So here we have one three-year old jumping up and down, and one twelve year old crouching down on the floor puking into a packet. A packet that we discover has holes in it!!! From about 3 different directions I get handed tissues and another plastic packet. Like an efficient mom I promptly place the now puke filled bag into the spare plastic packet and proceed to clean up the mess - all the while Jetan is jumping up and down and I have a lady of about 70 years in age seated right next to me. At this moment in time all I could think of was - please let the mental telepathy work and Dean come down - but nope, nothing happens!
After about 20 minutes Dean comes sauntering down the steps with a huge smile on his face, oblivious to the trauma I have just been threw. He heads towards the front of the bus to fetch the pram and sends Tanner to me - now I have 3 boys!!!! One still jumping, the other one still green and Tanner! and of course looks from the passengers. I don't know if they were looks of sympathy for what I had to cope with or thoughts of "hasn't she heard of contraception?".
Well after about 10 minutes, in a chocka block bus, I am finally granted the relief of leaving the bus. So I pick up the 3 year old, usher the 7 year old forward while the 12 year old is hanging on to me. Jesse then stands in front of the double doors and says "Mom, I need to throw up"- and I tell him "No, you don't" but he is going all shades of green as he stares at me.
Well you can guess what happened the moment the doors opened!!!
We got back, boys went to shower and we have just discovered that there is a leak in the water pipe.
All this and only 3 hours of sleep last night - Charming!!!!

Where are we now?

I have no idea:) I got a shock when I looked at the last blog date...so terribly sorry yáll...it's been far too long. :) I think the last blog was about Edinburgh...we went back there because it's a brilliant city ...buzzing.... I was quite intent on finding a strip of beach, because I saw on the map that Edinburgh was near the coast (duhhhh), up till then we had mainly been going to the Fringe Festival which was in the middle of the city, so when we jumped in the van and tried finding the "waterfront" I wasnt impressed to find is was mainly a harbour, but 5mins out of the city we arrived at a strecth of beach...and ended up playing soccer on the sand with the kids, eating fish and chips and leaving at about 5pm, with a few hours of daylight still to kill. We made our way from Edinburgh to Coldstream, about an hours drive, intent on attending a Mass Band day at Floors castle the following day, which we eventually did.... was great....toured the castle, watched the piper bands, falconry display, ....and Jesse even volunteered to run down the field, eagle descending on him from the sky to fetch a piece of meat he was holding on a plate above his head while he ran.....it was hysterical! The eagle dived, Jesse dived, and almost had his head taken off, but all was good fun and no harm done.

We left Coldstream and travelled 3hours the next day to a small village called Kircubrite, on the coast of Scotland. Not much in the village, but a real community vibe. They had a small military Tattoo that evening, which we REALLY enjoyed, with Scottish dancing in the street, the Welsh Guards military band ( really smart) and a Welsh choir. The local "parish" had donated the chairs for the evening...a nice touch. They had all the kids walking up and down with flags of the world, with Thomas the steam engine leading them... Tanner got the SA flag, but I noticed Jesse had swiped it from him by the end of the parade...:)

We stayed at "Cur-coo-bree" 2 nights and then I found some events we want to attend, on the web....a jousting tournament in Stevenage, a motorway event with drag bikes, in the middle of England somewhere(I forget) and an airshow on the west coast, 75% up England. (jee whizz I need to improve my memory/geography.!)

To get to the jousting, we have spend a night behind a farmhouse in Buxton, in the Peak district...lots of beautiful scenery. I saw a horse getting new horse shoes this morning while emptying the grey water for the van....a task which involves putting a bucket under the van, opening a handvalve, letting the bucket fill, and then carrying it to the drain area. In most campsites these areas are centralised, but on a farm they can be anywhere....although most CLs are really good.

We have decided that we need to jack up our website of travels thus far, so the plan is as follows:

1. To stick up a big map.
2. To put numbers for each area we have info on.
3. You click on a number, and a list of photos will load up.

On the technical side, we want to have a load of technical info (plug point pics etc) on a different section of the site, for people who want to see this type of info. We'll load our site blog and pics on a few travelling forums, and capitalise on selling advertising banners on various sections of the site. :)

We left Scotland yesterday....and saw a sign saying Welcome to England. It was a bit depressing. Scotland for us, is a brilliant place...we loved the towns, the people, and the culture. Nothing wrong with England at all..but Scotland has a special place in our hearts. Och Eyeeee!!!

Parked / Laundry

M is doing laundry in a launderette in an Edinburgh suburb while I'm parked with the kids in the van in the street. We moved things around again yesterday. The kids, and the tv, are now back in the bed area above the cab, and Jetan has his own "room" in the small area at the back. This leaves the central eating area as M and my evening chill out area, which converts to a bed...not the most comfortable, since in the middle of the night Jetan ends up shoving inbetween us, and I end up curled on one side....but, at least all the kids can be sent to their "rooms" when I need them out of our hair. It seems to work well...according to the past 12hrs anyway :) Living in a van is all about management ;-)

We're back in Edinburgh, and looking forward to see-ing more of the Fringe Festival which runs all week, then we go down to Keslo for a mass band competition with pipers and dancing, and another at Kirkubrite on the coast on the 27th. We'll most likely travel right down to Wales for a few days, and Cornwall area and back across to London around the 5Sept, and across to France around the 10th. Later than we had planned, but we can make it up later. Internet access in France is our biggest worry...if we cant find it, we wont stay long....but campsites should provide it if we do proper Internet searches.....

I must say that none of the actual itinerary plans we made before leaving have actually worked out :) Mostly because when you get to an area, your tastes at the time change. We dont really want to see another castle for instance.:) Lakes...seen those. Stone buildings.....done that. We're having a great time, but it is difficult to see something new every day, when you travel for so long..Things become familiar quite quickly, so you start seeking out things that are really different... like EURODISNEY. We havent booked yet, but going to soon. I'm looking forward to our next 2 weeks, but dont really know what to expect of France at all. Does it have anything that England, Scotland and Wales dont have for instance. Oh Yes....it has the French :) That should be something to grasp...the language gap. I can just see myself... excusem moi??? Wherrrreee du eyeee finddd La der Internetttt connectioneee Sil vu Ple?

ok, M is back with the clean clothes. Gotta go. Bye.
D

Aaaaah A nice hot shower.

Welcome back loyal blog readers:) THANKS FOR THE COMMENTS. Sorry if we dont email anyone back individually, but between managing the workings of the van, maps, gps, business, fun, kids etc, we are really bushed at the end of each day, and even writing a single mail to a single friend becomes a difficult thing. Living in a camper is a bit of an experience. Each day you have to balance the input (tyre air, oil,diesel,water,gas) of the van, the output(old shower and washing water, toilet stuff) as well as the input (food,dry clothes) and outputs (toilet times, showers, eating, clothes washing) all around the same 5x3metre area, inhabited by 5 bodies. On top of this, roles change, and furniture arrangements change depending on time of day, and our location in the world is adjusted day by day. It all makes for a VERY interesting existance, VERY different to the normal life in a house back home. After spending about 60days travelling , we have done well adjusting to this mobile existance, but can be honest and say it takes a very special mentality to cope:) Luckily as you all know, Marielle and I have probably spent the past few years working together within the same office space, even at home, so we have learned to live together without killing each other. I wouldnt suggest anyone try this without first locking themselves into a room with their spouse for an entire weekend, and see-ing how it goes...and I dont mean any hanky panky.....get your minds out the gutters!
We spent the morning walking up a beautiful forest pathway leading to an old stone tower, overlooking Perth. The kids had a great time riding on their bikes, but on the way down decided not to heed our cautions, and Tanner ended up sliding into a patch of stinging nettles, which grow wild here. Fun fun fun.
ok, I have to go shower. Here is M to take over the blog for today :)
Hi everyone! Talking about showering, I have just had a really nice hot shower for a whole 5 minutes. It cost me 20p (R3.50) but was worth every cent. Showering AND dressing in a space that's just over a metre squared each night is NOT my idea of fun. This is how it goes each night: Spray with the shower hose (that is dribbling most of the time), switch hose off, lather, rinse, dry. By now that's not that easy cause the floor is wet!When it comes time to brushing teeth: it's rinse brush, switch tap off, put toothpaste on brush, brush teeth, put tap back on, rinse mouth out, switch tap off. Of course this is all done hoping that the water tank doesn't run out of water mid-way. Fun Fun Fun!
Dean mentioned that we walked in a forest area today. It was absolutely stunning so you can imagine how disappointed I was when my camera battery went flat. I managed to get one or two photos of us walking up but couldn't take anything when we reached the tower. Of course I wouldn't have had much time because between trying to feed the boys (yup, we carted the rolls, ham etc... up with us) and stopping Jetan from running along the clifftop, taking photographs wouldn't have been top priority anyway.
We are at CL in a place called Upper Largo (East coast of Scotland), the view is beautiful however we are parked rather close to the main house which is a bed and breakfast - we kinda like the places where we've stayed and we've been in a farmer's field. Dean STILL hasn't bought levelers for the van, so we are currently on a slight slope which is not fun at all. Supper was Roast chicken and pasta for the boys and some healthy cous cous for us grownups. I really need to start laying off the junk we are eating. Junk food i.e. biscuits are WAY to affordable here... AND everything is like 3 for a pound etc... I decided to buy some water to drink today which I have been seriously neglecting to drink but our 3 year old!!!!!!! yup he turned 3 a few days ago, decided the grass needed watering. So down went 3 bottles of the water.
At this moment I am not sure of our plans for tomorrow. Oh yes, Dean is just reminding me, we've run out of gas so Kircaldy is the one place we can get a new bottle (according to the internet). So that is where we are heading. We drove over an hour to get here today and haven't actually seen anything in this little town so I think that we may explore tomorrow otherwise it's been a waste to come here. I am just feeling so exhausted though and I must be honest and say I LONG for my king size bed back home and my Friday night TV. Sob!
Well on that note. It's time to go to sleep. Boys are still awake but not for long. I am hoping that we can watch the dvd "The Queen"now.
We'd love to hear from you all. Till Next Time then.....