Our weekends have tended to be full of events and trips and the weekdays a mixture of catching up on chores not done during the weekend and collapsing at the end of a long day, with a little bit of Italian lessons thrown in on the side. We tried to sign up for lessons at the local community college to follow up on the beginner's Italian we took last year, but there was not enough interest. As we have a big Italian trip planned for May-June, we thought we had better get to it ourselves and have picked up a couple of textbooks. We now spend a couple of hours each week re-learning the things we forgot from last year and slowly adding some new stuff as well. Hopefully we are ready for touchdown in Milan. We are incredibly excited about our big Italian trip - from Milan to Bellagio on Lake Como, Verona, Venice, Ravenna, Sienna, Rome and the Amalfi Coast. We hope it provides us with the same fantastic memories we got from our big French tour in 2010.
So we've spent some time planning that trip, arranging all the hotels and flights, and have also been looking at trips closer to home. We are planning a trip to the Orkneys for April, just a Friday morning flight to Kirkwall, a tour around the islands - Skara Brae, Scapa Flow, the Italian Chapel, St. Magnus Cathedral - and some very nice seafood. We'd fly back to Aberdeen on Sunday evening. In an effort to catch both the northern and southern ends of Scotland, we will probably be heading to the Borders in during the Easter break. We'll try and catch Rosslyn Chapel, Melrose Abbey and try and feed my Viking fixation with a trip to Lindisfarne Abbey. We're feeling some pressure to get out there and make the most of our time in Scotland because we know it will likely come to an end some time this year. Some of our time over the last month has been spent in thinking and planning for this eventuality, so we'll let everyone know where we're going and when we're going when the time is right.
A while back we saw that the Cirque du Soleil was coming to London and Fiona arranged tickets. We flew down for the weekend and saw the show at the Royal Albert Hall, which was an amazing sight in and of itself. It was a nice relaxing trip, with no pressure to go anywhere or do anything in particular. We ended up wandering down to St. Paul's, but it would have cost 30 GBP to get in, so we just took it in from the outside. Compared to all the other churches we've seen in our travels, it's not that great. It is grandiose, large and imposing, but it also seemed very utilitarian and lacking in some of the decorative touches that made the Italian churches so amazing. After leaving there we picked our way through the hippies camped out on the front lawn and did a little shopping before meeting our friends Scott and Andy, who had flown in from Denmark to see the same Cirque show, and a bunch of their friends. It was a grand evening, quite fun, with a multitude of mojitos consumed at a Mexican place close to the Thames.
The Cirque show, Totem, was quite good, with the typical arrangement of 'they're-not-really-going-to-do-that' type acts and stunts. I think our favourite was the dual trapeze. The Hall was a perfect venue, although I did find myself gazing around the room, away from the action, a little too often.
We've also been busy on the Aberdeen social scene, arranging a Burns Night for a bunch a friends and colleagues at a local hotel. I put the kilt on, we ate some good haggis and had a grand night of dancing. We also attended the American Women's Association Mardi Gras party last weekend. Good fun again, with a really tasty jambalaya and lots of dancing afterwards. I even won the table prize for finding the baby in my King Cake - look it up.
It's been beautiful weather here so we are likely going out this weekend to enjoy. The flowers are in full bloom, with snowdrops in the shaded areas and crocuses sprouting all across the lawn. I can't wait for the daffodils. It certainly feels like spring, but I have a hard time committing to it because we really haven't had any winter to speak of. I think I remember scraping my car only three or four times all year.
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| Royal Albert Hall |
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| Albert Memorial |
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| St. Paul's Cathedral |
