A photo a day

Merry Christmas!

Matt and I spent a lovely Christmas in Devon. We found a great place to stay on TrustedHousesitters. It's a beautiful cottage surrounded by farmland. We arrived on Christmas Eve and after a mini tour of the area, hunting for Christmas Bon Bons, then unpacking and generally getting organised, we settled down for strawberries, cream and Champagne (yes, I said Champagne) in front of the fire.

The next morning we got up early to call home, then put the turkey and pork shoulder on to roast. Needless to say we had waaaayyyy too much food. But what is Christmas without a little indulgence. We had a lovely brunch of ham steaks and eggs, with more Champagne. : ) Christmas, indulgence.


Once we were finished eating we redecorated their Christmas tree to add a little sparkle and rocked the Christmas Carols

We opened our presents which was a lot of fun, we had wrapped everything individually to make it all that much more fun.

Then we jumped back in the kitchen to do the veggies, dancing away to Christmas carols.

We had an incredibly decadent lunch and then chilled out on the couch and watched some TV.

Later I took the dog for a walk and checked out the gorgeous surroundings.

Boxing day was very quiet, and we headed off on the 27th, checking out the lovely town of Sidmouth on the way.

We arrived in Bristol during summer and it was lovely. We spent our first couple of weeks just relaxing, drinking far too much wine with Zelda and generally having a great time.

We took up residence as Zelda's lodgers. The house was a lovely townhouse on its own private walkway.

After a couple of week's of rest we knuckled down to find work. Matt had to head back to Australia for a while, so I was job hunting on my own at first. I got a job at the Cuban down near the water. It was a love, hate relationship. My workmates were absolutely brilliant, we had a great time after work and even during sometimes. They made going to work bearable, even enjoyable on occasion. The long hours and totally unethical Head Office nearly did my head in, but all in all it was worth it for the money we earned towards our trip.

As all we did was work, it's not surprising that I made my best Bristol mate and hopefully lifelong friend Teddy. He was the only one who kept me coming back to work sometimes. He has a brilliant sense of humour and an incredible way of looking at the world. I can't wait to read his first book which has some inspiration from the characters (and I do mean characters) at the Cuban.

Matt got back after about 6 weeks in Oz and found a job at a sports bar called Racks. He quite enjoyed it, except for the ceilings that were way too low.

Work was about a 50 minute walk away so I bought good old squeaky. My 1950s (yep an original) bike, that you could always hear coming. He saved me a solid 30 minutes on my commute and I loved him right up until he decided to continually get flat tyres (due to very old wheels).

We didn't get up to a huge amount while we were in Bristol, but we did have some lovely dinners, and a great day checking out the suspension bridge.

My trip to work took in the Cathedral every day and the gorgeous library building, which was also great to feed my reading addiction while we were there.

After a lovely week in Madrid it was time to show Malaga off to Matt.

A lot had changed since I was living there in 2006, so much of the construction work had finished and the city looked fantastic. The best things about it through were still the lovely little cafes and eating spots, the brilliant fresh food markets and exploring all its little and big streets that twist and turn and bring you out at unexpected places. At least until you get used to them.

Madrid was brilliant. Long, hot days, fun hostel, and beautiful art.

We ate tons of Jamon Serrano, picnicking everywhere from plazas to a gorgeous park, watching the sunset and overlooking Madrid. We did a great free tour which gave us lots of fantastic historical details and tips about Madrid.

The hostel was great fun, we met a bunch of random people and even made our own little bottellon in the plaza and met some native (very underage) Madridites.

We went to El Prado two days in a row, making the most of their free hours and checking out the Thyssen and Reina Sofia on their free days too. We hung out in the main park, very pretty, and roamed the beautiful streets.

One also did a day trip out to the beautiful, historic town of Toledo. The whole city is like taking a step back in time. We went to all the 'must see' attractions, but the best part was just soaking up the city.

From swimming with Whale Sharks we headed to Mexico City stopping off for a day in Veracruz to break the journey.

Veracruz was very cruisy, we went for a wander around the waterfront and stopped off at the fish markets for some AMAZING seafood stew.

We slurped on some traditional icey like delicious fruity concoctions.

We arrived in Mexico City a couple of days later to meet up with MEL!! YAY!!

We spent a fantastic 10 days hanging out, relaxing, watching the World Cup. We even made it to Angel Place where the Mexicans all converge to celebrate. Incredible atmosphere.