2017 plans [fingers crossed]



Adventure one: Feb 17 > April 08

Motorhome tour of New Zealand with a group from Camping and Caravanning Club. As usual, we'll add bits onto the beginning (Singapore and time in Christchurch)  and the end (time in Bangkok). The blog's HERE.

Adventure two: 11 May > 17 Jul

We're taking our Touareg and Caravan on a tour of the Balkans - half of it with the Camping and Caravanning Club. The blog's HERE



As usual, we'll do some of our UK coastal tour before we return to Nerja for the winter months. Not sure how much we'll cover - there's work to do on the UK house......😖



Now, that's a lot of driving - but we did 13,000km around South and Southern Africa last year, so we rekon we're up to it.😎😎. As ever, we'll try and understand a little about what makes society in each place tick, especially in the light of the events of 2016.

That was a year, that was...

2016 - a year of highs and lows for the Arnott family.  

Things went a bit pear-shaped after returning from South America. Glossing over some pretty major family health scares, a real highlight was the wedding of our eldest daughter - a real party wedding in central London - wonderful.



..and what a change since the last post. We are to have our European citizenship removed through Brexit, the Scottish Nationalists are looking for another chance to split up the UK and we have a wonderful new Leader of the Free World in waiting. Isn't that great?  Never mind, I'm sure it'll turn out OK. [thanks to Sherman Law for the image]





...but this is a travelling blog so let's get back on track and catch up.

We're back in Nerja, looking at the sunrise from our newly tiled terrace: uplifting indeed.

It's been great to get back to our Nerja bubble, particularly walking, tapas etc. with friends.

The Travelling Car
We decided, with sadness, that it was time to say farewell to our trusty VW Touareg; after its adventures with us it was probably glad of the rest, although it still looked great. We've replaced it with a... Touareg - but not the two gearbox job like the previous machine - this one, although 4x4, probably wouldn't be quite so good in the Sahara and Icelandic rivers as the last one. But we've been there, done that... This one feels totally different; fallen in love already - central London, country lanes, motorway and, most importantly, towing - all perfecto.


The new outfit:

UK Travel
We've completed more of our coastal tour with the new motor: North Wales and Devon, both fascinating in their different ways. As often is the case on these trips, the distribution of wealth along coastal towns and villages often changes dramatically - sometimes in just a few miles; this was certainly the case in North Wales. As we moved further south below Paignton in Devon, the narrow winding roads were quite a surprise. Interesting with the 'van on the back I must say... I also managed to scratch both sides of the shiny new Touareg at the same time as we drove to the coast down an increasingly narrow lane... but, hey, adventures, that's why we bought it. 
We also managed to catch up with friends old and new along the way, which was great.

Some random images as we travelled:


Bodnant House & Gardens, Colwyn Bay

A WW2 submarine at Gosport:

Imagine working this in action;

South Devon Railway:

Pretty Brixham:

Arriving at Greenway, Agatha Christie's Summer House:

Dartford Naval College:

Planning Ahead

We've planned some interesting trips for 2017. More later. Fingers crossed!!

Home and Away

We're back in the UK after our full-on South American adventure which turned out to be all that we hoped it might be and more.

 So family things, the usual jobs and administration of life fill our time before we're off to Nerja - although there's a delay we're hoping to get there soon.

Time for dinner on the embankment, though - a Christmas present from daughter and partner gratefully consumed. Looking at the impressive skyline as we walked in the freezing temperatures, we couldn't help wondering who will be in Boris's seat next year. Strange, unsettling times I reckon.

Travelling...

We're currently travelling in South America. To see the blog see link on right or click HERE.