It's pretty exciting/scary/awesome for us to be heading off on such a big adventure - the last time we went this far or for this long was back in 2008 with one 20-month old kiddy - so you do the math!
This day has been a long time coming given it was way back in December last year that we actually booked our flights. Sometimes it felt like the day would never come, and now all of a sudden it's upon us.
So I thought it would be fun to share a little of our planned itinerary with you here so you can keep track of us on our adventures:
First up a short hop over the ditch - Wellington to Sydney, followed by a 7 hour wait in transit in Sydney - and yes it's a poor connection but it's the only bad one we have on all our flights so we figured we might as well get it over with at the start while we're all still fresh as daisies.
Then we have what must be one of the longest airline legs ever - a straight 15 hours through to Abu Dhabi - phew! Although again I figure it must be better just to stay on the plane than the palava of having to get off somewhere else halfway there and get back on again.
We're staying 3 nights in Abu Dhabi - incorporating a day out at the world's newest ultimate water park at Yas Waterworld. We're all super excited about this - especially the prospect of being able to ride up to 40 hydro slides, and the fact that the temperature will still be in the mid-high 30's during the day makes me even happier!
After 2 full days in Abu Dhabi it's back on the plane with one short-ish leg of 7 hours to England. We arrive just after lunch and have hired a car to drive the 2.5 hours down to Mark's mum and dad's place in Somerset.
The rest of that week should be pretty relaxing while we get used to a whole other time zone and then we have some special family time planned for that weekend and an early Christmas celebration with Mark's brother and family coming for the weekend too.
On the following Tuesday, we're heading for London Baby! The Nikinator aka Nikki from Life's Wonderful Happenings has kindly agreed to let us crash at her place for 2 nights. On the first afternoon we've got plans to visit The Natural History Museum - I think the dinosaur displays are going to blow Noah's mind! The next day we're booked on a hop-on hop-off bus tour with The Original Tour - we figured it's a great way for the kids to see the sights of London without having to walk for miles and miles - it'd be naive to expect that little four-year old feet can walk all over the city without grumbling!
Then on our last morning we've also booked tickets to go on The London Eye - I never got the opportunity to go on it while living in London for three years so I'm super excited to take the boys and be able to get a bird's eye view of this glorious city.
That weekend, Mark is hoping to be able to take the boys to watch his local team Yeovil Town play football. Yeovil have defied extraordinary odds going from a non-league semi-professional club when we left England 11 years ago to now being a professional club in the Championship - only one division below the Premiership. That's 3 divisions they've climbed in 10 years - an incredible feat really!
.jpg)
The following week we've got an exciting mini-break planned at Legoland in Windsor - I think the kids are going to be awestruck at all the rides and cool life-sized Lego not to mention the parents!
We're ending our trip with a few days in Wales staying with Mark's brother James and his family. They're school teachers so their half-term holiday starts on our last weekend so we are trying to make the most of our last few days spending it with them at their home.
And I'm sure before we even know it, the time will be up and we'll winging our way home again, thanks to the kindness of Etihad Airways. Etihad have recently launched a Flying Nanny service which is meant to be operating on our London-Abu Dhabi and Abu Dhabi-Sydney legs to it'll be great if we can take advantage of this too to keep the boys entertained other than with an iPad.
So that was a bit of a whistle-stop tour for you through some of our travel plans. But......the thing I'm looking forward to most though......just having time to hang out with my wonderful hubby and these 2 little cherubs.
I can't wait to show them the sights and sounds of our big wide world. To open their eyes to other cultures, and to see the world through the wonder and beauty of their young souls.
Bring it on I say!
No comments :
Post a Comment