Only 6 days to go!
We head off on the 22 August (2018) to London for a couple of weeks to do some touristy things, plus I will spend a number of days at the National Archives, the British Library, London Metropolitan archives and anywhere else I may need to find more on the elusive James Phillips and those who went to India.
From London we head to Belfast, again for me to to do research while Kirby will head off on day trips, though we will do some together. We will also visit my wonderful second cousin and hire a car for a week to visit family locations – thanks to Bobbie Edes for tips and Margaret Coleman for the wonderful map.
From Belfast, we head to Scotland and down into the Wood family territory, mainly Midlothian, and then will do more touristy things. Then it is back to London and then home, arriving on the 27 September.
Helen gave me the most wonderful journal to take on the trip and I have tried to replicate that a little with the header image. The journal has been packed into the bag for the plane (with the laptop and iPad) so that I can do the blog AND write into the journal.
When Maree and I travelled overseas in 2015, we did a blog for the whole of the trip and uploaded photos as we went along. I am so glad we did that because it doesn’t take long for memories to fade. For example, who would want to forget the sisterly debates about directions while trying to navigate out of the car park at Dublin airport and onto the motorway to Galway? The bonds of sibling love were severely stretched that morning. But seriously, even today, I enjoy looking back at what we did and where we went. For those of you who may be interested you can still view the blog here. However, I did find using Blogger a bit of a pain on the iPad so for this trip have decided to use one of my own web sites which is currently sitting idle.
So we are now officially 6 days away from heading overseas. Am I packed yet? Of course not but the spare bed is strewn with clothes (well really, if I am being honest it is the whole bedroom) ready for ironing and packing. We are only taking one suitcase between the two of us – a Samsonite soft case, plus a backpack. We have two lovely hard shell Samsonite suitcases but they can be quite heavy and, as I will be the lugger of suitcases, I wanted something that would be easier for me to use. There will have to be some hard decisions made about what to take. The weather has been quite hot in the UK but I see that the temperature is dropping and it is sitting between 10 and 17 degrees in Belfast.
The dogs, I think, suspect that something is going on. Harley, who is my shadow, is now even more so – tracking me everywhere (and I mean EVERYWHERE) and being quite sooky – not like him at all. He is also doing everything he can to get attention but perhaps that is just a male thing. Roxy, on the other hand, doesn’t steal clothes etc but is known to dig holes to China at times!
I think that I am almost up to date with GSQ bits and pieces and my To Do list has almost everything ticked off with some final things to do over the weekend. Of course, Murphy’s Law will come into play and I will get onto the plane on Wednesday morning and suddenly remember something really important that I haven’t done.
Number 2 son and I have had THE chat about communication and that his mother would really like to know how he and the dogs are getting on. He has agreed to be contacted via Facetime – an amazing concession, though I will use the old-fashioned telephone at times too.
Hi Cathie
Your trip looks fabulous.
Have a great trip
Trish Sampson