In the end we covered 5,996 km in 27 nights on the road (the 28th was on the plane). We had about four days when we drove for over six hours, and we got through two sets of felt tips and five princess colouring books. We only had two tantrums – one from Pip and one from Laurie. The accommodation only didn’t work out one night. We stayed in four B&Bs, three cottages, one hostel, two rented houses and with two cousins at their homes. We kayaked, fished, hiked, swam in rivers, lakes and oceans, watched sunsets and moonrises, starry nights and shooting stars, barbequed and picnic’d, ate lobster, chowder and poutine, and Indie learnt to crawl.
Bath-time now (err, for Indie, you understand) so I’m signing off but what I’m trying to say is it was fantastic!
Yesterday was Laurie’s dance class show – the Dancebreaks Spectacular 2010. We’d missed the last four weeks of rehearsals by being in Canada, but that didn’t stop Laurie. Well, it didn’t stop her turning up, but it could have been the reason she followed a more improvisational choreographical style than the others.
In her first dance, the other bumble bees all awoke on queue and danced together, but Laurie ‘s bee slept through the first half.
In the classic tap routine “I’m a pink toothbrush” we were treated to some virtuoso thumb-sucking
Lion King and Wipeout went better, although none of her ballet clothes or tap shoes fitted any more so everything was borrowed in the end.
Due to a drop-out, I became the official photographer, although it was too dark to get any sharp images. So there are a few more on flickr.
We’ve covered a lot of distance since the last update. We’re currently in Glenora whisky distillery, just north of Inverness, in Nova Scotia (New Scotland). We also are experiencing traditional Scottish weather.
Laurie is dancing a mini ceilidh, and Indie has just crawled her first crawls. Laurie also learnt to crawl on the floor of a Scottish hotel dining room.
Since Ottowa we had two nights in Quebec City – 36 degrees and humid is perfect for a city tour day with two kids – then we finished with French-speaking Quebec and crossed time-zones into New Brunswick. Two seven hour days in the car, and an out-of-gas situation in the longest empty section of the trans-Canadian highway, got us to Saint John’s on the Bay of Fundy, but the kids were going mental by then so instead of the beautiful coastline we spent three hours exhausting them in the soft play centre. Pip and I also dined on the remains of Laurie’s child size pasta from lunch, which says a lot about portion sizes here!
The next day we drove 40km to a scenic cliff-top drive, but missed the signs and so didn’t see any Bay of Fundy at all. We pressed on over the 13km bridge to Prince Edward Island and rounded off the unaccompanied section of the trip with the surprisingly good Anne of Green Gables house, and a swim on the red sandy beaches in the National Park. Then across PEI to meet the Aunts – Gin, Liz and Lucy have now joined us. A day of hiking, swimming and lighthouses at the East Point of PEI then on Sunday we took the ferry to Nova Scotia, where we are now starting the Cape Breton trail.
Again, limited photos on my iPhone, but I do have this one of a large beaver.
It’s Sunday night so we’re at the end of our first week in Canada. We’re staying in Ottawa with cousins of Pip’s, and as well as a spare room, they have wi-fi, so I may blog.
We flew from Heathrow last Sunday on an 8:30 a.m. flight, so the girls were exhausted and slept on the flight. Air Canada were much better than their call centre suggested, and weren’t fussy about the number of car seats we had, didn’t make us check the buggy into the hold, and didn’t insist on the tyres being deflated. They didn’t fine us $50 when Indie sat up in the basinet, although she didn’t get a seatbelt, as warned, and we had to hold her tightly whenever we felt the plane might crash. The eight-hour flight actually went very well, the girls were perfect, and by the time we arrived Indie has trained a couple of rows of people to tilt their heads on her command.
We picked up a car at the airport and drove West to Niagara. We unloaded at a lovely little B&B in Niagara-on-the-Lake, then drove on to Niagara Falls in time for the illuminations and the 10pm fireworks. By then we’d been up over 24 hours, it was 3 a.m. UK time, and we were so spaced out we sat in the car for 15 minutes waiting for a rain shower to pass, before we realised we’d parked under the fallout from the mist-plume, and we just needed to walk five metres to the dry.
Anyway, the falls are great, although the town is horrific, like a low-rent tawdry Las Vegas, if that’s possible.
Having successfully beaten jetlag (four hours sleep in 44 and anyone will sleep for eight hours) we returned to the falls in the morning so I could take Laurie on the Maid of the Mist boat into the spray. Highly recommended if you’re anywhere nearby.
We then turned and started the 1,700+ mile drive East to Novia Scotia. Toronto is a great place to see why building bigger roads doesn’t reduce congestion – we hit the evening rush-hour, which starts at 2:30 p.m. and which gridlocked the 16-lane highway both ways!
We then spent four nights at Cousin Julia’s place in Brighton, with its own private beach on Lake Ontario. This was a really good time and we ticked off most of the Tengs, with Julia, Kathy and Toivo in Brighton and Bonita and Mike further East. We even managed a night out on Julia’s birthday.
On Friday we were back on the road to Ottawa, via a fairly unexciting boat trip through the Thousand Islands from Kingston. I’ve decided the back-country, with its gentle green hills dotted with lakes, clapboard houses, red barns and silver grain silos, is endlessly beautiful, but the big-ticket tourist attractions can underwhelm. No more boat rides for us. Also much cheaper that way!
We’re staying here with Tom and Kyna and their kids, and spent yesterday looking round Ottawa with Geoff and Tanya. In the evening we had dinner with our hosts plus Roshelle & Bud and Uncle Ed & Valerie. That was all the Williams done!
Today was lunch in Kanata with John Muggeridge, his wife, and three of their six kids. Our two both fell asleep there as they’ve seen and done so much recently. Indie also sucked into my lap as it is Fathers’ Day.
From lunch we drove out to Carp for a picnic with Ed, Valerie, Geoff, Tanya and Roshelle, swam in the river and floated down the rapids for a couple of hours. Then back to Ed’s amazing property for a barbeque and tour before the girls finally flakes out completely and we has to bring them home and carry them to bed.
Tomorrow we have our longest drive, six hours to Quebec City. The forecast is sunny and 29 degrees.
I’ve not got many photos to show you on my iPhone, but this is Laurie after her incarceration for asking which day was Children’s Day.
It is Pip & my fifth wedding anniversary today. We are cooking each other dinner at the moment, Pip is just preparing the desert. We’re drinking five year old burgundy as well.
We watched our wedding DVD with Laurie earlier. Indie wasn’t so interested.
Pip wrote me a poem. I was touched. I shall share it.
On our fifth wedding anniversary
In 2005 we walked down the aisle
The ‘newlyweds‘ we were tagged for a while
We provided a memorable family event
When we tied the knot at the church in Kent.
Then off on our travels to Borneo
I still have the leech bite on my toe Amazingdiving and a hammerhead shark
As marriages go it was an exciting start.
The following year there was lots of walking
Not round the block, 54 miles we’re talking
Meanwhile I started sporting a rather neat bump
We squeezed in sailing in Turkey before making that jump
The one into parenthood, how scary was that?
A minute little bundle we put in a hat.
Lorelei Moss that grew curl after curl
And sent our old life into a crazy new whirl.
We weren’t going to lose out on travelling though
Now we just holiday with the relies in tow Morocco or camping of off on some run Picassa will show we’ve done well on the fun.
Then me changing jobs to tackle England’s obese
But I managed to quickly secure a release
To go back to St Thomas’ to pop out number two
Our wonderful Indigo completing our crew.
So five years ago on the 21st May
We sealed the deal that paved the way
To all these events that shape my life
Darling Barn my best move was becoming your wife.
Indie had her squint correction surgery today, a 45 minute operation under general anaesthetic at St Thomas’ Hospital (where she was born). Pip’s been in pieces but actually it went as well as you could possibly hope for. She didn’t cry or get upset at all during her six hour fast, or when she went under, and not even during recovery. We were discharged at seven, amidst the crowds of TV crews and journalists setting up their election-night broadcast patches all over Westminster Bridge and around the Houses of Parliament.
If you like close-up videos of eye surgery, here’s what she had done, courtesy of Channel 4.
Two photos, before and after:
Our second annual Highlands trip was at the end of April 2010, to Dundonnell and Fisherfield Forest, near Ullapool in Wester Ross, the Scottish Highlands.
Gin, Ol, Kitty, Griff and I (Pip was in a play in London so had to stay behind with the Grandparents for support) planned three nights of rough camping and Munro bagging. It didn’t go to plan because Flybe lost my bag on the way up – I didn’t fancy a 4° night in a tent wearing just my jeans and t-shirt – so we spent Friday night and Saturday morning finding a place to crash, and borrowing bits of kit. Anyway, once we’d begged and bought enough stuff that I could survive the weekend, my bag turned up, so we set off just 16 hours late.
The area is known as the Great Wilderness, and the further in you go the more remote it feels. Because we’d started so late, we camped only about five miles in, on the bend of a river under some budding silver birch trees. It was a perfect spot.
Even if it was surrounded by deer corpses – there were three within five meters, and they scattered the whole area, victims of this year’s particularly harsh winter… After setting up the camp, we took a little stroll to some waterfalls a mile or so off.
On the Sunday we had a choice of hills. The most dramatic, An Teallach, was not possible because the rivers were in spate and because the crags are dangerous enough in the summer when they’re not covered in snow. The girl who lent me some waterproofs had a friend who slipped off the path two years ago and fell to her death.
We chose Beinn a’ Chlaidheimh, the northern summit of a long ridged massif of three Munroes. First off, crossing the icy burn. It was a simple climb, with just a little scrambling at the top, and the weather was good throughout. The summit was attained after a few hundred metres along the snowy ridge, then we descended a little and stopped for lunch.
On the trip down we detoured to a waterfall before returning to another camp-fire, another great dinner from Kitty , and drank all the whisky we had left.
On the Monday morning we struck camp and walked out via the Shenavall bothy and the foot of An Teallach. The route was boggy but beautiful. We were back at the car for 2:30 and the airport for 4, and I was in the bath in London by 8pm!
Thanks everyone, I had a great time!. Full photoset is on Flickr here, and there’s a map here.
This weekend we went to the Bargehouse behind the Oxo Tower to see the lasers at Speed of Light. Laurie loved it, and got “My favourite Princess is Cinderella” woven into the soundscape. It was very hard to photograph, but recommended as a visit although you’ve only got until 19th April.
Afterwards we piled children into an ampersand, and went through the Waterloo graffiti tunnel.
Also some photos from Easter weekend, when we took advantage of the lake at Paul Foston’s golf academy in Ashford on the way back from Kent. Jo, Peter and Lucy even picked up some free training.
We went to the Barbican yesterday to see the birds playing electric guitars. Recommended!
Today we went to Discover Stratford for Children’s Book Week or something. During Maisie’s Birthday Party, Indie projected more vomit over Pip and I than she’s produced in her whole life to date. Bleugh.
