Moose on the Move!

The following month passed a little more quietly. We stayed home in England and enjoyed some of the events (organised and natural) happening in the local area.

On the weekend of the 13th and 14th of November we caught the train up to London to
meet up with Lian and Laurent (remember back a few months... they are the one's who dumped us in the forest in Belgium). Lian had just got back from a short time in India as part of the final stages of her studies.

Lian was happy to be outside in fresh air and so we walked around the city visiting various famous sights. As we were walking along the river we were stopped by a family of German tourists and asked where was the best place to watch the fireworks from. Smiling sadly we all assured them that they were a week late: Guy Fawkes night had been the previous weekend.

Satisfied, we carried on along the river away from Parliament buildings. As we wandered, taking in views of the London Eye and the various musuems. As we got closer to the next bridge we were suddenly engulfed in a mass of people. We stopped to ask what was going on and were told that the Mayor's Show had been on that day and there was about to be a fireworks display. Oops. Hopefully the Germans had asked someone who knew what they were talking about and made it to a good viewpoint!

A few days later, back in Exeter, as part of the Winter Festival, the city was hosting the Festival of Lights in the Cathedral grounds. There was a procession of hundreds of school children carrying bamboo and paper lanterns and a huge dragon type thing that led the way. There was a large stage set up where various 'rocking' choirs did their thing. The host of the evening was a presenter was from local radio station, Gemini FM. We met up with Ben and Dayna (from around the corner) and two of their friends, Simon and Alison, to enjoy the festivities.

The big finale of the night was to be the lighting of the christmas lights in the streets and in the Cathedral Green. Well, after much standing around stomping our feet (it was very cold that night) and several practice countdowns (the lighting was apparently going to be shown live on the local news program) it was time for the real thing! Eagerly we jumped up and down and counted down with everyone else in the crowd, but alas, when we got to "1!" there was no great illumination... in fact there wasn't much of anything, except the host saying "Oh, I guess that was a rehersal too. No? Oh. Well we can assure you that the lights in the streets are now on!". What a dissapointment!

This month we expanded our camera kit by buying a 50mm fixed focal macro lens. For those in the audience not photographically inclined - we bought a lens that lets us get really really close to things and still keep them in focus. Cool. All kinds of things in and around our home became targets (boots, tomato, leaf, coins etc. etc.) and the results were quite pleasing! The neat thing about macro photography is that anything can look really abstract and beautiful.

We also had a play with our tripod and a slow shutter speed. There is an interesting piece of artwork in the high street here in Exeter, it is a tall narrow cone shaped piece. In cross-section it is a star. The whole thing is silver metal and highly refective. In each alcove there is a large silver ball. So - we took a photo with the camera aimed at one of the balls, with us and some of the Christmas lights. Chris and I both look seriously bent - but it is kind neat too! Love night-time photography!

A few days later the temperatures in Devon dropped. The weather forecasters started telling us about the way the wind was going to change direction and bring arctic winds from the north down across the country. They assured us that there was snow coming and that it would probably come down over the whole country. Excellent! Sure enough, the frost came down and a couple of days later the snow! Overnight the whole area was transformed!

That weekend (Saturday 26th November) we took a drive in the countryside. We headed first up to Winkleigh to visit the School for the Christmas fair. It was fairly similare to fetes back home except that it was completely indoors owing to the weather.


From there we headed south and drove around Dartmoor for a time. We went right down to the south-west corner of the park - a much more rugged and empty area than where we had been previously. I had spotted on a map some time ago, a small village that I wanted to visit, and it was towards that spot that I guided Captain Chris. Before long we arrived at our destination - DOUSLAND! (Dous is my family's name). It was a tiny village (and in reality, a little non-descript) that took about 10 seconds to drive through from one side to the other. Unfortunately the postoffice was closed so we wern't able to but a post card, but we did stop in at the local hotel/bar and convince the guy behind the counter to let me have one of their Christmas menus! It has Dousland on it! We also stopped by the town's welcome sign for a quick photo.

As we drove home through the Moor it seemed that the whole county had been out making the most of the unusual snow. We must have seen a hundred snowmen and women of all shapes and sizes. Also there were dozend of people out walking and having snowball fights and generally froliking in the 'winter wonderland'. If we're going to be honest, Chris and I also pulled over and tossed a couple of snowballs at each other. It was a really nice afternoon and did a lot to build our excitment about the upcoming skiing trip. Snow is great!

In posts to come - Amsterdam and Norway! Stay tuned!

Also - just a quick reminder about the images. If you click on any of the images above, or here , you will be taken to our photos page. Once you are there, you can have a closer look at any of the photos by clicking on it. In fact if you do click on an image you will be offered a choice of how big you want to see it. Cool.

Less than a week after we got back from Denmark, I sursprised Chris for his 30th birthday with a trip to Wales.



We drove most of the way in the dark because the sun is going down earlier here now but with Guy Fakwes night being the following night, we were surprised all the way there by random fireworks being fired off on both sides of the road all over the country side. I guess some people couldn't wait the extra day.

Because of the plentiful darkness we had a little trouble finding the right turn off and we had to stop in a small country pub (again - we always do this when we get lost here). We were a little concerned going into the pub because the Welsh accent is spometimes difficult to understand - also - as we approached the pub accross the dark carpark we became very aware that the whole building smelt strongly of fish...

The locals inside were very helpful and gave us some very complicated directions to basically go back down the road half a mile and turn left and then right.

Finally we made it to our accomodation, a small cottage in a coverted farm house. The owners knew would be arriving late and had lit the small fire inside the cottage so the whole place was beautifully toasty warm when we arrived. It was a great little place, complete with big bathtub, comfortable bed, large TV, DVD player and a welcome basket (bottle of wine, half-loaf of local bread, Welsh butter and honey and a few other bits and pieces). Wonderful!

Saturday we enjoyed a little sleep-in and breakfast of Welsh-cakes and tea. The view from the farm yard outside was beautiful. Our cottage (and the others in the complex) are situated half way up a hill and overlook the valley and river below. In the daylight we could see how swollen the river was from all the recent rain. Across the valley is the town of Lampeter and it was there that we decided to head first.

The weather was quite drizzly so we decided not to stop in Lampeter and instead carried on towards the coast and a town called Aberaeron. It was a nice town and after a quick look around we headed further north, following the coast until we got to Aberystwyth. (If you're having problems with the pronunciation - don't worry - so did we. Infact we had to resort to pronouncing the names in really stupid strong Aussie accents so that when I said the names Chris would know what to look for on the road signs...) The drive was a lovely one, Wales looks like England and yet it is different somehow as well. Even through the drizzle it was pretty.

In Aberystwyth we found a parking spot and headed into town. As we walked I spotted an interesting window display and we went over to have a look. There was an amazing assortment of items in the window - it looked like a second hand shop run by an eccentric with no sense of order. As we walked around the corner we spotted a sign in the other window of the building. Both of us chuckled when we read what it said. Apparently, none of the items in the windows were for sale, merely to keep passers-by interested as they walk past! (so it was run by an eccentric with no sense of order - but a good sense of humour).

We had no idea what we were looking for but we knew the New Zealand vs Wales rugby match was on (being played in Cardiff) so we headed for a pub, thinking the atmosphere would be great. The pub we selected seemed a prime rugby-watching spot - small, cosy and showing the rugby (very important). However, on entering you'd have guessed that the whole town was filled with adament non-drinkers. There was not a soul in the whole place, save for the barmaid, who was sitting on a stool at the end of the bar having a cigarette. (It never ceases to amazes us when bar/cafe staff smoke in their own establishments).

We settled down for an exciting game of rugby (neither of us is too sure about all the rules) only to see the Welsh team get absolutely trounced by the New Zealand team. We started to think maybe it wasn't a bad thing that we were the only two in there.

On leaving the pub we made our way to the seaside, avoiding grumpy, drunk and swearing Welshmen, looking for somewhere to have dinner. We found a spot overlooking the beach and from where we could see various firworks displays at the other end of the bay. It was quite nice.

All the way back to our cottage we were again surrounded by fireworks, it seemed like everyone in Wales was celebrating the imminent arrival of Chris' 30th birthday. We seem to get this everywhere - huh? (Remember the nice little display that the French government put on in Paris for our 1st anniversary?)

The following day we woke late again. Chris counted the grey hairs on his temple and decided that no new ones had appreared over-night. He opened his presents, among which was a hip flask emblazoned with the Welsh feathers. The idea behind the hipflask (not something I would ordinarily buy for Chris) was that he would be able to keep a little nip in his pocket when we hit the slopes at the end of the year in Norway. I had planned to make him a cake while we were here, but we didn't get around to it.

We headed back to Lampeter for a bit of lunch. Being Sunday after Guy Fawkes, almost everything in town was closed and we ended up have a late lunch in a pokey little pub. Several locals stopped in for a drink while we enjoyed our lunch and we had the opportunity to listen to a range of Welsh accents: everything from mildly welsh, through quite amusing to completely incomprehensible.

After lunch we headed back to the cottage, packed up our gear and the left over welsh butter and honey, signed the guestbook and heade home. We took a slightly different route back to the M4 and drove though the Brecon Beacons, a lovely country drive though impressive scenery, especially in the evening light.

That night at home we made and decorated Chris' birthday cake - blue icing because he's a boy (I know I know, what a stereotype), but also because he likes blue. It was yummy but took quite a while for just the two of us to get through.

Denmark has been on our list of places to get to since before we left home at the beginning of the year. For anyone who doesn't know, Elke lived there for a year, after she finished high school, on exchange.

So we finally got organised and booked a a trip over to Copenhagen to visit Anette and Kent and their little daughter Laura who was born in March.

We decided that because we were flying out of Stansted, which is to the north London, we would drive to Cambridge and stay there the night before our flight. The idea behind this madness was that we would therefore avoid a mad rush in the morning to get all the way to Stansted and we would get to see Cambridge (a little bit).

So on Thursday evening October 27th we drove all the way to Cambridge, this turned out to be a much longer drive than we had expected. There was a lot of traffic on the M25 (the big road that circles London) and we ended up spending quite a bit of time comparing the motorhomes that were crawling along beside us. We did take along a book-on-tape thingo to make the trip that little bit more exciting.

We arrived in Cambridge late and after dumping our stuff, we took off for a quick look around the city. However, the 24 hour drinking laws hadn't come into effect just yet and everything was mostly closed and there were not too many people around so we decided to head home and get some sleep.

The next morning, we again went into the town centre to take a look at it's famous colleges and so on. Cambridge, like Oxford, is a University town. There are several very old colleges and buildings all over the place. As we didn't have a huge amount of time, we sort of just wandered around a couple of the main streets and had a quick glance into some of the courtyards of the bigger colleges, including Kings College. It was a nice taste of Cambridge and we will certainly put that on our list of places to revisit....when we get time :)

After a quick lunch, we jumped into the car and headed back to Stanstead airport. The flight to Copenhagen is only about an hour long. It still amazes me that we can fly to another capital city in another country in about 1 hour. Anyway, Elke was pointing out some of the sites and where she thought the airport was. However we flew straight over the airport and back over some water we then came over another land mass which confused Elke a little as she was pretty sure we should land in the airport we just passed. The plane then turned and headed back for the original airport Elke thought we should be landing at. The land mass we were currently over....was Sweden. It just so happens, that things are so close here, that you need to fly over another country...just so you have enough room to come down to land on the runway of your country of destination. Amazing!

We caught the train into the city and went to the hairdressers that Kent (our host) owns. He and Anette live in Holbaek, which is about an hour's drive west of Copenhagen. Here we got to see Kent and Anette's beautiful new home, and even more importantly, their beautiful new baby, Laura. It was fantastic to catch up with them all. We had a lovely feast and then an early night.

Saturday morning, Kent took off to work and Elke, Annette, Laura and I all walked down to into the town centre of Holbaek. It was a beautiful day with blue skies and loads of sunshine. Holbaek is a nice little place. We went to one of the grocery stores and got a couple of extra things for our traditional Danish lunch and headed home.

Anette whipped up a beautiful meal, which we shared once Kent came home. It included various types of herring (pickled, marinated etc), liverpostei and bacon, frikedeller, rugbread and remoulade. Yup..it all sounds very weird, but it tasted great. It was especially nice washed down with a cold Danish Carlsberg in one hand and some icy schnapps in the other. Lunch lasted at least a couple of hours so we just spent the rest of the day lazing around, playing with Laura and generally catching up.

On Sunday, we loaded the five of us (four and a little one) into their little car and drove out to see some of the beautiful Autumn trees on the way to Fredensborg Slot, one of the Royal Palaces.

We drove up to the palace, where the Danish Royal Family lives outside of Copenhagen, this, of course, now includes Aussie Mary Donaldson and Danish Crown Prince Frederik, and their newly born son. We arrived right on time for the changing of the guards. It was fantastic. First Kent got a great parking spot close to the gate, then we got to see the changing of the guards, and then...we heard some commotion and glanced over to see Frederik and Mary leaving one section of the house to go to the main palace for lunch with the rest of the royal family. Perfect. Elke did a quick lens change and snapped a couple of 'paparazzi' style shots, imediately afterwards suffering pangs of guilt. They didn't last too long.

A large portion of the Palace grounds are open to the public and we wandered around enjoying the sunshine and blue skies and fabulous autumn colours in the trees. As we were leaving we were lucky enough to see Prince Henrik (the Queen's husband) and Prince Joakim's two little boys, leaving after thier lunch. Elke respected their privacy this time and didn't take a photo.

After a lovely lunch in the park, we headed back to the car and took off to one of the other Royal Palaces in the middle of the country in a place called Fredricksborg. This palace is no longer inhabited but the church can be used. The gardens here are in the Baroque style and include a monogram made in hegdes for each of the royals. It was a peaceful place to visit and walk.

Laura was tired in the car on the way home and Anette had to sing to her most of the way back. Elke and I are now quite familiar with a whole range of Danish nursery rhymes and children's lullabies.

On Monday, Kent had to work again and so all of us went into Copenhagen with him. Anette, Elke and I went shopping and found a ski suit for me, for our trip to Norway at Christmas. I own a ski suit! While we were in the Copenhagen, we saw the changing of the guards at Amalienborg Palace (the Copenhagen residence of the royal family), we went on a canal cruise and saw the little mermaid, the new opera house, Marmor Kirke and various other Copenhagen sights. It was a nice day in Denmark's capital. We would like to go back at some point and see a few more of the highlights that we didn't get to this time.

That evening Anette and Kent dropped us off at the airport and we said "goodbye 'til next time". The flight home was uneventful, but because we didn't think about our flight times very carefully when we booked, we then faced a four hour drive home. We arrived back in Exeter in the wee hours of Tuesday morning and fell gratefully into bed.