Going to London

Hi everyone,

A few days ago we were in London. The first day we were there we went on the London Eye! Does anyone know what that is?  Its like a big ferris wheel except you stand in a big ball thing that is glass and it takes half an hour to go all the way around. You can see not even close to all of London, but sure enough you can see quite a bit. You can see Buckingham Palace, Big Ben(which sadly we couldn't go on a tour of because the pope was coming and it was closed for safety reasons). You could also see the big cathedral (cathedral is a big big church). After the London Eye we went to a London Theatre. That is very special to go to. There we saw a play called Oliver. It was about a boy named Oliver who is an orphan. When he asked for more food he got sold. The time this story took place in was 1830 and the place it took place in was London. Oliver went through a few people, first a guy that sold coffins and then he went stayed with a man who taught him how to Pick Pockets. There was also a mean man who worked with him. A rich nice man who Oliver pick pocketed, took him in to his grand home and looked after him until, yikes, he was stolen back by the pick pocket man. la di la di la. The bad man hurt the pick pockets girlfriend who was trying to help Oliver. But the mean man was very sly and good. Oliver was very scared on Saturday night because the mean man was trying to kill him. And then, good news alert, the nice man saved Oliver's life and took him in to live with him.

My Granny Bird and Grandpa B took me. It was fun.


Bye for now.
Emilia

A Day's Hike

We went on a hike and we saw a huge spider at the beginning. On our way back, I walked right through a different big spider's web and the big spider ended up on my leg.

The spider was about the size you see in this picture.

After the hike we drove to an animal feeding farm. We fed llamas, mountain sheep, and elk. Elk are very very soft. The llamas and mountain sheep are very messy eaters. One llama didn't want the another llama to get any oats so it spat some of its oats out at the other one. We weren't allowed to get oats for the elk, so we fed it grass instead.

Where we were feeding the animals, there was an awesome playground. There was an outstanding, super fast zip line thingy-ma-bob that you sat down on. Loney, the crazy dog, got off its leash and chased us while we were on the zip line. It almost ripped Mima's pants!

Today was fun. Hopefully tomorrow will be too. That's all for now. Hope you read everything that is new. email me if possible!
Bye , Mattias

Aufwiedersehen!

And so it is, the end of the summer and the end of the easing in to our trip. We have had a fabulous two months of what I would call pretty easy travels with some fabulous meeting, reuniting, and seeing so much family and a few friends.   Bruce and Mona were more than generous with their box full of maps and camping guides as we found our way through France, Spain and Portugal.  Everyone else, as mentioned in Bernie's post, sooooooo (as Emilia would say) generous with their homes and the dolling out of ice cream to the kids! I think we will all go into some withdrawl as we head out on our own tomorrow.  We will learn to carry our own packs, find our way through various public transportation hubs, and likely slow our pace and eating habits. Hopefully we will not become so desperate that we have to "pick a pocket or two" .... Or as Oliver would sing - "food, glorious food"....could I please just have a little more..... (Thanks Grandpa B and Granny Bird for the great evening out on Drury Lane, London and the Theatre Royal, the kids are constantly singing these songs.)


We will head south through the Balkans as Indian summer has arrived back in Europe and start by trying to squeak out a few more warm days in the Slovenian Alps before Autumn truly arrives.  The tent will be folded away for emergencies and then probably not for use again until Africa. Hostelling, pensions and whatever else we can find will be our new homes en route.


We are looking forward to a new start to the next part of our trip - and as always, hope to hear from many of you via your great comments or email!