Saturday, September 17, 2005

Visiting Old Lizzie at Buck House





Each year during the Summer, parts of Buckingham Palace are opened to the public. It was quite cool to be inside and see Buckingham Palace from the other side of the front gate.

I remember when I was small we had a visit from Theo & Susan, an English couple Dad was friends with from the days when he used to work on the P&O cruise ships with Theo. They gave me a jigsaw puzzle of Buckingham Palace that I really enjoyed putting together. Every time I visit the palace I always think of that puzzle...

The bottom photo is taken from behind the Palace - a beautiful day and great weather for siteseeing...

Sunday, August 28, 2005

Ellie Playing Outside


Ellie enjoying a nice day in the backyard. She loves water and had so much fun playing in her little pool. Afterwards there was some time for some hugs with her Aunty Liz & Uncle Mark...




Friday, August 19, 2005

A Day At The Farm


A Day At The Farm, originally uploaded by mkdougal.

We've been in London now for just over two weeks.



As part of Reuters involvement of Community Week (normally a May event but because of busy times we are only now in August able to participate!) I am currently standing outside Hackney City Farm.



A bunch of Finance staff are going to spend the day tidying up the farm ready for an open day tomorrow. Should be fun...!



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Sent from my Treo

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

A Sense Of Closure

A number of people have commented that our trip still hasn't officially ended, as our last post was from Rhode Island which, as you point out, is still more than a couple of hours from New York.

Well, the good news is we made it back; however I'm sure you already knew that :)

The last part of the journey was somewhat eventful - it began pouring rain and visibility was greatly reduced. A number of crazy drivers also appeared on the road, including one bus driver who decided it was time to move into my lane, despite the fact that I was already in it...

A number of hours driving through Rhode Island and Connecticut brought us to the New York state border. We were almost home! Everything went smoothly on the approach to NYC, until we reached the Triboro Bridge. In all the rain and darkness we missed the Manhattan exit and ended up in Queens.

We got ourselves back on track and finally arrived back home at around ten to Midnight. After moving our bags back into our apartment, we cruised the streets looking for a spare parking space. We were keeping the car for the week, as Mum & Dad were flying in for a visit later that week.

It came as no big surprise that street parking was just not available, and so we decided to use one of the many parking garages scattered across the city. I really don't know how people keep cars in the city and search for street parking on a regular basis!

We were home at last - what an adventure! 65 days and 17,500 miles later we had journeyed across the entire United States, visiting all 48 contiguous states as well as a quick trip into Mexico and Canada. It really was the adventure of a lifetime. I said to Liz as we arrived in New York City - "that was fun, lets do it again!". For some reason she wasn't up for that suggestion...

We're Almost Home...!

It's 8pm, we've just finished a nice Thai meal in Providence, Rhode Island & are about to head out for the last stretch of highway through Connecticut and back to New York.

It's been an amazing journey - one that we will remember forever.

It's been tremendous fun, & we have really enjoyed bringing you all with us along the way.

Looking forward to catching up with you all sometime soon - wherever you may be across the world...

MARK & LIZ

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Sent from my Treo

Sunday, June 26, 2005

A Bit Of News...

Just a quick post to let everyone know that Liz & I are engaged!

We are in Montreal, and I proposed to her last night as we were strolling back to our hotel. Yes, I did go down on one knee, and yes Liz did cry :)

Saturday, June 18, 2005

Indianapolis Grand Prix


We happened to arrive in Indianapolis on a Saturday, and were very excited to catch a few laps of the Grand Prix! It wasn't the Indy 500, but it was on the same speedway as that race.

We ended up staying in town overnight, as we had run into some more car troubles. Luckily they turned out to be minor, and we were on our way again the next morning.

Only In America!


Have you ever arrived at a service station and found you were just too tired to walk a few feet to make a call? That payphone next to the cashier just a little too far away to get to? No problem - just drive up, drop in your quarter and start talking!

During a quick stop at a service station to fill up the car, we had one of those "It could only happen in America moments"...

An Awesome Breakfast In St Louis


Our last stop in St Louis was spending the night at Kelly Tripp's place. Kelly is another friend from Reuters, who very kindly invited us to stay with him and his family. We took this photo in his backyard, with Kelly and his two children Garrett & Heidi.

Kelly cooked us an awesome breakfast and sent us on our way with a full & happy belly. Thanks a lot Kelly for having us over, and it was great to see you again, and to meet your wife Karen & your two kids :)

Dinner At Charlie Gitto's


After a quick stop to get changed, we went straight from the Arch to meet Tricia & Megan (some more of my friends from work), and their husbands Bill & Tony for dinner. I thought I'd really dress up for the occasion...

They took us to Charlie Gitto's - a really nice Italian place for dinner (Tricia had told me St Louis was famous for it's Italian food, and I can see why - it was delicious!).

Thanks Tricia and Megan for organising the dinner, we had a great time :) And Tricia, I'm glad we finally got to meet in person after all this time!