Should have mentioned that we also purchased a car. We bought a red Citroen Xsara for $4,000
the cardealer had just reduced it by $2,000 - its low mileage and will suit us just fine..... So now we are independent

Beautiful Bournemouth beach where the sand is sifted daily - its a 7 mile (they use miles here) walk around from Boscome to Poole on boardwalks.

And this my friends is Bournemouth. Its on the pier - a real English scene

Another photo of Poole Harbour

On Sunday we went to Bournemouth and Poole - about 1 1/2 hours from Surrey. Jacqui and John thought we would like to visit this area before we actually move down here.

This is Poole harbour

After Godalming we went to Guildford which is quite a big village - its beautiful and this is us on the right enjoying a pub lunch of pie, mash and peas!

So Here we are.

We arrived at Heathrow an hour earlier than anticipated which meant the my sister Jacqui and her hubby John were not waiting for us. We sat and drank in the atmosphere at Heathrow for half an hour or so until they arrived and drove us back to their home in Ockham.

This photo was taken the next morning in a little village called Godalming - very cute. We made some purchases here - boring items such as shampoos etc

And now we leave Singapore for our 13 hour trip to London!!!! FINALLY

Singapore airport is absolutely beautiful - we had a real shock awaiting us in Heathrow however - it is revolting. We were herded through rows and yelled at like cattle. But the woman who processed our documents was very nice and said she was most happy to have us come and work in her country!! That was a nice start

Had to take this - three guys riding around the main street sitting in the back of a ute - Health and Safety not the same issue here obviously

We found it very difficult to find a good coffee in Singapore - this one we had in a hotel opposite ours on Orchard Road.

Robbo on our bus trip around the city

Shopping centre

I went off on my own one night and discovered this huge shopping centre - well actually there are many many huge shopping centres but this was right next door to our hotel. There was a very nice supermarket and deli underneath which I thoroughly enjoyed meandering around in - purchasing some pate, bread and NZ wine!!! Shopping is so much more thrilling without Rob!

Raffles

This is Raffles - we didn't actually manage to have a gin sling here after all - very expensive and we were hot and tired and couldn't be bothered to walk all the way to the end of town again!!!! We did however have a good look around and it is WONDERFUL

The coach driver told us you can pay up to $6000 for one night

Sorry about the sideways photograph (I'M writing this up at the Cobham village library) and am unsure how to rotate it. But you can see the beautiful greenery which is every where in this very clean green pristine city.

Singapore

Rob insisted on wearing his New Zealand tee shirt which received all sorts of comments -some we were not sure how to interpret! However, we got chatting with an Australian couple about our age and they kindly took this photo. This is on Orchard Road where our hotel was. A pretty ghastly hotel I might add, however it was right in the centre of things and we weren't there very much.

Singapore

Our flight to Singapore departed Auckland at 12.25 on 10 June - we wanted no family members at the airport (we had already said enough goodbuys over a period of 10 weeks as it was)!! We stayed our final night with our good friends Graeme and Diane Sterne and Di kindly delivered us at the airport. We were very excited to finally be on our way and had a great trip.
Really like Singapore airlines - they keep feeding you!!! my kind of Airline.
Arrived in Singapore 10 hours later to a very hot 30 degrees!! We were able to shed our winter clothes and haven't needed them since!

Ari and Maia

These are the last photos taken of Ari and Maia before we left

- and oh Beck off to the side - we are really going to miss our precious five grandchildren!

Final days in Beautiful NZ

We left NZ on the 10th June but have only now managed to update this site. Apologies to family and friends for the delay - I now understand what people mean when they say its not so easy to access the internet whilst travelling - they are quite right!

These pictures are of our last weekend in beautiful NZ around the Waitemata harbour on a beautiful winters day.

We picked Bella and Felix from school today

afternoon tea at Burger King

Friday night at James and Debs for Indian

Morning coffee with Lane, Zoe and Gabrielle O'Malley at Cafe on Kohi

We're Off

We received our long awaited for Visas on Friday, booked our tickets and tomorrow Tuesday (10th June) we leave for 3 days in Singapore and then to London arriving on Friday evening.
Jacqui and John (my sister and brother in law) will meet us at the airport and we will stay with them in Surrey for about 10 days before heading down to Bournemouth to get settled.

Further Lunch

The kind staff of the Research Office took me to the wonderful Italian restaurant in the Chancery!

Family Lunch

This family lunch was held at Rebecca and Frank's. It was a superb day both family and weatherwise!

Numerous Farewells

This was the first of many work goodbyes - these are the wonderful people, friends and work colleagues I chose to share my farewell lunch with - Jenny (Ben) aka JayJay, Me, Val, Kirsten, Di, Dave, the Professor and Dr Love. The Langham has a wonderful buffet and as you can see a great time was had by all.