Scotland trip - Great Grans Funeral

This week I had a quick trip to Scotland for Great Grans funeral.  We had hoped to see her for Christmas, but I guess God had other plans :+)  It is quite a trip to Ullapool two plane rides and two bus journeys to get there.  It was great spending time with mum's side of the family and hearing all of the stories.  Grans funeral took place in the Church of Scotland where she has been a member for the past 38 years, she was buried in a small graveyard in Clachan just nestled at the bottom of a hillside in the highlands, where there are 8 generations of MacKenzies buried.  Ullapool is a lovely small seaside village where both the MacKenzie and McIntosh families come from (also Inverness).  It was also good to see my Nana, all the way out from NZ.  It was a really big trip for her, but I know she is keen to get home and start ticking things off her own bucket list (have fun!).

Getting Ready for Winter

The weather is changing!  We went from wearing shorts and t-shirts to jeans and jumpers literally over night.  The mountains around my school have been covered with fog and my fingers cold in the mornings, it seems to warm up by the afternoon.  Knowing we are on the downward slide to winter we brought warm jackets and winter gear for everyone.  Corban especially likes her snow suit, she looks like the "man going to the moon" she tells us.

Biking to Germany

A great day for Taylor today, she biked 140kms to Germany with a group of students from school.  She passed through a number of places, stopping for lunch in a place called Litomerice and also passing through a place called Decin (significant WWII).  I am really proud of her getting out there and giving this type of challenge a go.

Prague Zoo

Went to the Prague Zoo this weekend just gone, it's massive! We got around about 60% of it before we were all tired and ready to go home. There is a much bigger range of animals than the Auckland Zoo, lots of interesting animals to see. I must admit I quite enjoyed seeing the dogs with their owners, drinking beer! Hilarious. Only zoo I know where the beer is cheaper than a drink of coke or kids juice. We came home on a little boat across the river.  Allan went back today with a guy from my school and his two little girls, so he has managed to see the whole thing. He did find it funny seeing seagulls in cages! Leo was pretty lucky to also have a ride on a small pony. Allan said his face was completely smiles the whole time. http://www.zoopraha.cz/en

Riverside School Picnic

Today the school had it's 'Welcome' picnic. It was a shared lunch, everybody brought a dish from their home country. As you can imagine there was a huge range of food, it was fantastic! Allan made a pavlova to take, which was popular with the Australian's. Some teachers played music even though their lead singer left for Dubai this year. Corban enjoyed this, she played and danced her afternoon away. Taylor played football and rugby out on the field with some other Senior High students, while Leo ran wild on the field, played in the sandpit and park. Corban has struck up a friendship with a little girl from my school who lives in the apartment upstairs, so when we got home they collected their toy animals and went and played in the shared garden (which is more like the enchanted forrest :-) All in all, a lovely day.

Beroun Pottery Festival

Another great weekend. We ventured outside of Prague this weekend, not far only about 45km to a little town called Beroun where we went to the yearly pottery festival. The photos don't do it justice. The whole town square and surrounding streets were full of pottery, not really my thing but some pretty interesting stuff to look at. There was heaps happening and people everywhere, we also saw some Dragon boat racing, and ate some more interesting food. Sunday saw us doing some shopping in the morning followed by exploring the largest park in Prague about 10 minutes walk from our place, had a picnic dinner and played until the kids needed to go home for bed. Beautiful hot weather.

Second Week in Prague

Our second week in Prague was still about finding our way around. I started work this week. It was difficult starting a new school year when I had only had one week off, moved country, and had to get my head around a new school system. I felt like I was watching everyone else working while I tried not to fall asleep. As everyone else began to fade towards the end of the week, I started to get my head around things and actually achieved some stuff at work. Allan was home with the girls this week and managed to purchase our Open Cards (travel tickets) which makes it much easier to get around. He got a few other things for the apartment and found some good parks for the kids. On Friday we also went to Corban and Taylor's school open days to see the facilities and meet the teachers. Following this was a family BBQ where we met plenty of new people and got to know our neighbours a little better. Our neighbours arrived on the same day as us and live on the 4th floor, Doug is Taylor's English teacher. The weekend saw us out and about. We ventured a little further this week and caught the Tram to Andle where we looked through a cathedral, walked along the river, found the dance studio/restaurant and also a shopping mall. Everyday is new sights and learning something new.

First Week in Prague

There were lots of new firsts during our first week. I have done some e-mail and facebook updates so I don't want to repeat, but am just trying to get the blog started with something interesting. In our first week we learnt how to buy food at the local Billa, opened a bank account and furnished our apartment, plus did some sight seeing. Doesn't sound like much, but it was really exhausting because we had to find a bunch of new places and how to get there. Not to mention I was still sick and Corban was still being sick every so often. Our first impression of Prague was really positive, its interesting and completely different from home. There are some small things that stand out, like the smell. We can't put our finger on it, whether it's the age, pollution, or all the dogs ... who knows?? I'm not kidding about the dogs, when we arrived there were dogs in the airport, we then discovered dogs on the metro, trams and buses, there are even dogs in the supermarkets! Believe it or not you can even take your dog to the zoo, slightly unfair on the other animals, but in Prague it's great to be a dog. We had some outings and discovered that Leo was happy to eat some unusual food, especially the Trdelnik (traditional Czech hot sweet bread). We also tried this potato, cabbage & bacon thing, plus great sausages. Learning to use the metro was a bit stressful, but we didn't even get lost. It was also lucky that our tickets were never checked because we had no idea if we were buying the right tickets or not. I guess all in all we survived our first week with not catastrophes and everything being a little easier than I had initially anticipated.

Moving to Prague

Basically getting to Prague was Mission Impossible IV! I was sick before we left and only got worse on the way. To make things more fun Leo started vomiting in Australia, I started on the way to Singapore and Corban finished off the trip when we landed in Prague. Lots of fevers, coughing and taking heaps of drugs is what got us here. I can quiet honestly say any photos we are smiling are completely fake! But we did get here alive, so I guess I can't complain:+)