}

28 September 2006

Congratulations Shirley!!

... and welcome to the world to her gorgeous, new little daughter, Keira Shirley Ann. As Dorothy Parker once said, well done Shirley, we knew you had it in you :)

Thanks to Shirly, I now know that Keira is an Irish name after a 17th century Irish saint Ciara - and it means little dark one... It's a gorgeous name - not least because it is shared by my zany, fun loving cousin in Canada.

Can't wait to meet little Keira in person when we come back to Cape Town in April.

24 September 2006

Cape Town family - holiday photos from the Drakensberg

Thanks for the photos, mum. All the photos of the kiddies on horseback brings back happy childhood memories!






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Back in Sydney

Back to wonderful Sydney. Jobs interviews have gone well and full time work starts on Tuesday - working for a web agency. Looking forward to it.

We stayed for close to a week with our wonderful friends, Doug and Claudia, in Bondi. How we will ever repay them for their amazing hospitality, I do not know. They have made our settling into Sydney such a pleasure. Once again, we enjoyed the beauties of Bondi Beach in the sunshine - there's been a heat wave in Sydney so weather was perfect for walks.



Anyone seen my ferret? A sign in Bondi.


We left the comforting bosum of Bondi and moved to a short term appartment in Manly, close to where I will work. 30 seconds from the beach. Great waves for body surfing and endless coastal paths for rollerblading. Tough life in Australia!

Its going to be a bit of a culture shock when we try to buy a house in the future and need to move into the suburbian sticks with massive commutes!! But we are enjoying beach living to the max for now.


What a treat! We got to meet up with my friend and ex-colleague, Martin Palmquist, from Volvo in Sweden. He is here on a business trip and we got to see him in Brisbane too when he was there. Martin is a fellow blogger. We lay on the Manly beach, caught some great waves and then went rollerdlading. Great to see him - made me really miss all the Volvo folks. He brought some of my favourite Swedish candy (thanks for the suggestion, Caroline!) so I was in heaven.


Our first dinner party in our own place - ok, well maybe not qite a dinner party!


By the way, on the trip back to Sydney from Brisbane, we stayed in the Tally Ho Motel. Made me think immediately of Russel as this is one of his favourite Russel-isms. So there you go, Russel - Tally Ho is a place as well as a farewell greeting!

16 September 2006

Priceless moments (2006)


Travel

  • Climbing Volcano mountain in Chile
  • Galapagos (snorkelling with Turtles)
  • Iberia
  • Mindo
  • Pantanol
  • Madidi jungle hike
  • Inca Trail and Macchu Picchu
  • Fitzroy
  • Torres del Paine
  • World's most dangerous road (Bolivia)
  • Iguazu Falls
  • Horses in the mist 
  • High tea at Bariloche
  • Rio de Janiero and Ally's red dress
  • Ferry journey in Chile
  • Isla Grande
  • Lewd frolicking in the mud at Parati
  • Ice climbing on Grey Glacier
  • Working on the blog.


Birds

  • Amazon parrots
  • Condors
  • Half a million Megellanic Penguins 
  • Hummingbirds in Mindo
  • Quetzel
  • Cock-of-the-Rock
  • Iberia  (39)
  • Mindo  (78)
  • Ballestas Islands (esp Inca Tern)   (9)
  • Galapagos  (27)


Sydney

  • Drive Melbourne to Sydney and Sydney to Brisbane
  • Sydney skyline and Opera House
  • Introduction to Sydney
  • Research for Mary-Anne
  • Two weeks in Manly
  • Finding and moving into Blues Point Road
  • Learning to use my new camera
  • Purchasing Canon lenses (18 - 52, 10-22, 200, 300, 400)


Food

  • Bull's testicles
  • Guineapig
  • Offal hotpot (Brazil)
  • Doug and Claudia's pepper-corn steak
  • Buffet by weight (Rio)
  • Torres del Paine fry up
  • Seafood with Doug & Claudia
  • Buenos Airies steak
  • Lamb chops (El Calafate)
  • Isla Grande self service ice cream


Movies

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