Farewell to England

This trip has officially started. We have finally left the shores of England on the Norfolkline ferry from Dover to Dunkirk. The sea is calm and if the Pacific is anything like this we'll be in for a treat. We were meant to be leaving yesterday, but this really wouldn't be a Wood family holiday if all had gone to plan. Yesterday we had waited for the post to arrive, which would have brought the last few travel essentials, but nothing worthwhile came. I suspect this might have something to do with all the nettles and bramles that have grown up around our letterbox. Had the right post arrived we would have set out after it came. So instead we went out and bought them in a shop, walked the dog along a canal, relaxed and finally tidied up the house in a bit of a frenzy. My mum's friend (Pam the Jam) who came to visit us on what was meant to be our last day in England pointed out that most people plan to go away and then they go away. Things don't tend to work like that in our household though.

We are enroute to Holland with our mum where we will probably be sleeping in a greenhouse if it's not too hot, taking our great aunt to the 'openluchtmuseum'- an outdoor museum with lots of old Dutch houses, seeing the 'Wild Wonders of Europe' exhibition in Den Haag- so I can stand next to the picture of the muskox and Jenny can see some of the photos up close that she has been cataloguing during the past year, and possibly going to see Mary Poppins in Dutch if Jenny gets her way. The real trip starts on Monday, if the trains are still running after the world cup madness. Ironically we'll be catching the first train from Schiphol airport.