My 50th Birthday – thanks for all the pressy and cards! We docked at around 8am. We thought it was going to be Naxos in Sicily, home of Mount Etna, but the Captain decided that it wasn’t safe to anchor and announced that we’re going to Messina instead! Weather looks good – it’s going to …
Read More
Day 3 – All at Sea
We didn’t get up until 8.30 this morning – I think that’s a record!!! 🙂 We’re at sea all day today on our way to Sicily. So we’re heading down the east coast of Italy in the Adriatic round the heel of Italy into the Ionian Sea. A full English breakfast in the restaurant before …
Read More
Day 2 – Hvar (Croatia)
Had a lie-in until 7ish this morning! We heard from Guest Relations that our luggage WASN’T found and put on the next plane to Milan. Bugger! This means we set sail without any luggage at all. The Ship’s ‘Plan B’ is to continue to search for the luggage at Milan and then have it sent …
Read More
Day 1 – Fly to Italy
Up at 2.45 am – that’s even early for me! A short taxi ride to Terminal 2 to get us there for the obligatory 2 hour ‘prior to departure’ check-in. On arrival at the Italia desks we find the check-in desks closed! Queues, queues and more queues! Once through check-in, we head for Security/Departure Gate. …
Read More
Day 0 – Travel to Heathrow
A real s*** journey down to Heathrow! Left home at 2.20pm and arrived at the Holiday Inn at 6pm! The main problem seemed to be the M1 around Luton where they are building an extra lane to ease congestion 🙂 Once we got through that we hit the M25 where it was nose-to-tail Yuk! An …
Read More
Our Holiday – Overview
We’re picking up the ship in Venice – ‘The Seven Seas Navigator’ – and we’ll be sailing around the coast of Italy in a clockwise direction. Venice round to Livorno and then disembarking in Monte Carlo. The total distance covered by the ship is approximately 1250 nautical miles
Queen Blog
We went to see the new film ‘The Queen’ starring Helen Mirren. It was EXCELLENT – a really well put together film using existing news footage and some clever reshot scenes of key events of the time. Everyone played their parts really convincingly!
Italian Blog
Ann laid on an Italian menu tonight. Debbie, Stefan, Karen and Paul joined us. Paul was fresh from his golf tournament – where his team won!
Han Blog
Visited ‘Han’ the Chinese restaurant in Market Harborough with David and Val. An excellent meal (as always!)
Lee and Humberto’s PC
Used Friday to get their new PC up-to-date and ready-to-use. Nice spec! and all for under 400 pounds from those nice people at Dell. We then went over to theirs today to get it all set up and give Bertie his first PC lesson.
Laser Blog
I’ve been doing some more research into HOW I still managed to get ‘flashed’ and my Road Angel Plus didn’t alert me. See my recent Blog HERE It seems that if you are close to the laser gun (less than 150m), then the device will NOT sound an alert! (Diagram courtesy of Blackspot Interactive who …
Read More
XDA Executive
I picked up my repaired XDA Executive from the O2 shop in Kettering yesterday. It’ll become a spare device just in case the main one breaks down. Due to a later version of the ROM on the new spare one, I was unable to quickly restore any of the data I backed up from my …
Read More
Best Motoring Blog ever…?/A great meal at Karen and Paul’s
I must admit, the thought of acquiring a total of NINE points on my Driving Licence hasn’t made me the happiest of people this week. I’ve been nervously waiting for Northamptonshire Ticket office to send me details of either:-1. The inevitable addition of three points on my Licence for speeding in Daventry a week or …
Read More
New Colour Printer
Our existing colour Printers (The Epson 1200 and Epson 1290) are slowly deteriorating. The 1290 now refuses to print any photographs or labels without smudging. The 1200 just won’t print anything! So, it was off the eBuyer to look for some good deals. We settled on a Canon in the end. The Pixma iP5200. Wow! …
Read More
Preparations for 50th Birthday Party
We put the finishing touches to the invitations for my 5oth. We’re going to have an ‘afternoon tea’ for those have to travel a long way and a Themed Party (TV characters from the 50s) in the evening with the neighbours
Worst Motoring Blog ever…?
Wow, what a great start to the weekend! – NOT! Firstly a(nother) speeding summons through in the post. This time it was in Daventry last Wednesday – 35 in a 30 limit! From what I recall, it was a mobile speed camera van. Uniquely, there seems to be an option whereby you the offender MAY …
Read More
Lee and Bertie – depart…
Lee and Bertie return home today. It was great to see them again, and they fitted around our busy lifestyle really well. The cats liked them too! 🙂
Lee and Bertie – arrive…
Lee and Humberto are staying with us for a week or so…
Edwards Blog
We visited the Restaurant ‘Edwards’ in Crick with David and Val tonight. Superb food and a very friendly atmosphere!
Roger, Jane and Oliver Blog
We stayed with Roger, Jane and Oliver for the weekend. I manged to fix the email problem Jane was having with their laptop. My, Oliver is growing!
Mick and Jane Blog
Mick and Jane came round for a late lunch. We haven’t seen them in quite a while! It was good to catch up, and we even managed to eat outside too! …will this Summer ever end? 🙂
A Significant Birthday Blog
Off to Paul and Sue’s this afternoon to celebrate a slightly premature 50th birthday for Sue. What an excellent event…a band…a close-up magician…and lashings of food and drink ..Perfect!
Pirates 2 Blog
Off to the Odeon to see “Pirates of the Caribbean – Dead Man’s Chest“ Hhhmmm…not as good as the first and a bit over-long. Still, it was good to see Johnny Depp in character again!
Air Con Blog
Phew! It’s been hot here during the last three weeks. So much so that we decided to invest in a portable air con unit. We got ours from from Alaskan – a company based near Roger’s business. The unit arrived today. It was really easy to set up and you can even program it to …
Read More
Family Meal
We were due to drive up to Lincoln and have a large gathering of the clan for lunch. Mae decided she wouldn’t be able to cope with the numbers, so Ann offered to do it all at ours! I then had to drive to Crewe for the Course I’m running on Monday… Phew!!! – Don’t …
Read More
Busy Blog
Here we go then, on our mega-busy weekend… Me – Peterborough haircut, then home. Pick up cats take them to the Groomers Ann – Northampton shopping to get the food in for tomorrow’s big family get-together Both – Pick up cats from the Groomers Both – Planned to go Stratford-upon-Avon to see Merchant of Venice …
Read More
Busy Weekend ahead…
Our mega busy weekend begins… Off to ‘The Pheasant’ at Keystone with David and Val. A superb meal as always!
Decorating Blog and Snooty Fox
We 99.9% finished the single bedroom today – a beautiful combination of two yellows (on the walls) and eventually a green carpet, with complementary curtains and bedding. Went to ‘The Snooty Fox’ tonight for a Neighbours’ N.O.S.E.B.A.G. Things didn’t start off too well. Some of us couldn’t make it, but didn’t let me know and …
Read More
School Re-Union Blog
Attended the annual school re-union last night. Ninety plus ex-pupils attended – a great turnout! Popped in to see Andy McMillan on the way. Wow! Alexander has grown and it was good to meet Christine again too!
Day at the Races
So, we went to Market Rasen today with Nick and Celina. The weather was disappointing and although it didn’t rain, the temperature was much, much lower than of late. Not a great day for winning either! We bet on four races in total, and the first three produced no winnings at all. Our horse ‘You …
Read More