Ulp..... we have just paid the balance for the cruise. Rang the travel agent at cruise.co.uk and when she confirmed what was owing, I just said "urrgg... let's move quickly on shall we?". It was all over in a couple of minutes. We put it on our BA Amex card despite the fees for that being higher than a Visa or Mastercard. It will more or less earn us a free companion ticket anywhere in the world on BA for 2015/16. As we are planning to return to either Australia or the South Pacific in the winter of 2016, that will sort the return flights out as we already have enough air miles for one ticket.

Have exhausted all car park/bus/train options and decided that the easiest and cheapest way to get to and from Southampton is to hire a car from Enterprise. Its £71 each way and they will bring it to the house and come and collect it from the house when we come back. The cheapest car parking I could find was £285. We've also arranged to increase our travel insurance cover up to 180 days. We couldn't increase the cancellation compensation amount so will just have to keep our fingers crossed on that. We are only really insured for about half of the total amount.

So, that's the nasty business out of the way. Now all we have to do is ensure we have the time of our lives on this trip and thoroughly enjoy every hard earned penny :)

It was our 25th wedding anniversary yesterday and this trip is our "present" to each other. Last night we went to Le Gavroche, Michel Roux Jr.'s restaurant in London with the girls to celebrate. Fabulous meal - probably the best I have ever had and such a nice man. Only wish the girls were coming with us next year.