'Once a year go somewhere you have never been before.' (Dalai Lama) This is certainly true of this year. The decision to come to Italy and France was an extremely good idea and I have to say we have rather fallen in love with both. Our hope was that we follow the sun and to our surprise, besides a few days, the sun has stayed with us. The season in the south of Italy was very much coming to a close and I think we thought it might all be over, but as we travelle...

What constitutes a good and faithful friend? 'Words are easy, like the wind; faithful friends are hard to find'- (W.Shakespeare) I hope that while you are reading this, dear and precious friends will come into your mind and you will smile at the very thought of them. When in 'my previous life' , I asked the children - 'what is a friend?' They would always say that a friend is someone who makes you laugh, who listens to you when you are sad and doesn't 'tell' ever...

I have to admit that the title of this is now historic but much of the detail in this was written a few weeks ago and has been delayed by partying with a lot of amazing friends in various locations in Italy including Tuscany, Umbria, Campania and Puglia. We are still in the latter and after 3200 miles we have turned around and are heading northwards and currently in Trani which is a wonderful, busy little fishing port. Our trip into Italy developed from Annecy w...

Driving through Italy has always been an ambition of ours. While Autumn descends on the rest of Europe, it has always seemed apppealing to follow the clear blue sky and the heat of the sun, for as long as possible. While planning the trip we then had the additional bonus that close friends wanted to be involved in our 'Italian Adventure', and to be honest September is just a social event, where we can all spend quality time together. We arrived into Italy throu...

I haven't got a clue where my last missive ended but I know it did not include Dubai so I think that I will re-start there. This visit formed the last five days of our World trip and we arrived there from Colombo with mixed feelings about our return to the UK although I would hasten to add that we could not wait to see our kids and friends! This was my third trip to Dubai and we were both excited to arrive as we were staying for a couple of nights in the Hyatt R...