HEY HEY!!

First up - Simon and Lucy..congratulations!!!

R&J, hope you enjoy Darwin and Alice Springs, and seeing Ashcherrelle, Harriet, Eoghan and Fiona at the weekend (tell Eoghan that there is an Eoghan in xfactor this year, so he may notice that more people can spell his name on his return!)

Went to a back to the 90s night on Saturday...oh yes! Whigfield's Saturday night and Spice Girls Say You'll be there were highlights!!! Was a lot of fun.

Miss you both, enjoy the sun,

Love N and E x

Hi there

I agree with everyone else on the photos and the blog. now that you are back in action you will have to keep it up. that is after Oonagh does her bit! for some reason I doubt if Mal will be on the case! After all the fab photos and descriptions our trip to Old Trafford will sound a bit dull. But if you had seen Andrew's face when he saw the pitch for the first time you would have loved it. I spent most of the weekend smiling at him cos he was so amazed! it really helped that they won 5-0! some of the goals were great and we were in the Wags end so Ronaldo and Wellbeck came over to celebrate with us when they had scored! we did the tour on Sunday and Andrew loved parts of it, changing rooms, dug out, getting to run on to the pitch(obviously against the rules but!!). The history bits didnt go down too well! at one stage he asked the guide 'who cares about this Duncan Edwards guy?'!!!

We went shoppin in the city and Andrew got to spend his voucher in HMV. Niamh and Ed sent it to him and it was burning a hole in his pocket. He is such a little consumer its unreal. The minute we checked in to the hotel he was asking them for directions to HMV! he found 4 christmas DVDs and a little bonus of about 15 packs of football cards!

He still keeps an eye out for Watford's scores!!!!

Claire came up to meet us on SUnday and we went off to Frankie's and Bennys for a lovely lunch. All in all we had a great time.

We are at home again now with a big fire on!! the snakes and ladders board is out again!

Hope the travellin continues to go well. Caroline came back last week and cant decide which is more depressing; the weather or the constant chat of doom and gloom! so enjoy the sunshine!

Love Bon and Andrew x

Hello

Sounds like you guys are having a great time, it's been nice re-living our trip through yours! Have fun in the 'red centre'! Make a point of looking at the stars on a clear night.

We're all well, just had our 20 week scan and there's finally going to be another girl Mole!! What a shock.

The herpetologist in me has to correct your poorly informed guide book. There are two Taipan species in Oz the Costal and the Inland. The one that you may have encountered in Cape Trib (the Costal Taipan) is very deadly but it is the Inland species which is the world's most venomous terrestial snake!! Lecture over!

Have fun on the rest of your trip, look forward to more stories.

Love Si, Lu, Jacob & bump xxxx

Oh dear - guilt trip about not doing blog yet and now I have to follow that wonderful account from James! What a wonderful sharing of a week that has obviously been a highlight of your trip do far.

Been up earlier today to say farewell to Ashcherrelle and just had text from Heathrow to say they are ready to board. Hope you all meet up ok in Melbourne later this month as planned and have good old catch up.

Having nice weekend with Annette and John, watching X Factor after nice dinner. Claire and Karl came over to join us.

H

James - you should be a writer, I had to explain to my work mates why I was laughing at my computer screen (to reassure them that it wasn't my excel spreadsheet!!)

That has beautifully filled the last 15 mins of work before the weekend - I salute you! Your trip sounds simply amazing, and don't even get me started on the camper van!!!

Have a great weekend, I'm off to watch the end of series 2 of The West Wing, gratefully delivered from Vietnam! Plus an M&S chicken pie, chunky chips, syryp puddings and a bottle of wine - good times!!

Love you both x

What a blog! I am saving that for a cup of tea over the weekend. It's Children in Need madness here. We have a quiz starting shortly - hope I can follow in my mother's footsteps.

The photos are brilliant, if there is one thing you get out of this trip around the world, you know that you have enlightened the lives of four lucky individuals by introducing them to the crisp sandwich. I congratulate you xx

Hi Nikita - it's great to see you on here. Really looking forward to seeing you soon Chi xx

Take care. Lots of love xxx

Hi guys,

What a great blog-I was getting tired reading it,you must be exhausted with all the travelling but it sounds fantastic-I don't know how you're going to face coming back to the doom & gloom of recession filled northern hemisphere.Glad you survived the falling coconuts-not sure if travel insurance would cover that one!

Heading over to sunny nunny in 2 weeks time.Looking forward to seeing more photos & hearing all about their trip.We'll probably be having a few quiet nights in as the visa bills will have arrived by then.....Tony not sure if hes travelling yet because of work-it will probably be just me.He had a big scoop last week,biggest haul of cocaine in Irish history so hes basking in the glory of it at the mo.Newspapers,rte & sky news-fame at last.Thankfully the navy did most of the risky work because the weather conditions were so bad but no-one was hurt thank God & the bold boys are now behind bars.

Are you looking forward to New Zealand?It will be a strange Christmas for all.We are heading to Portugal for Santa-really looking forward to the break.

I'd better go here & do some work-I've nearly been caught a few times...Love to you both,safe travelling & we might even get to talk to you when I'm accross the water.

Take care.

Chi.x

Hi Roisin and James,

Nikita here, just finished me homework and thought i would leave you a message, mum give me your site.Hope you are both having an AMAZING time, it must be so cool. Hope your mum and dad also had an amazing time, when they came to visit you.

Both of you, take care and i will keep in touch Nikita xxx

Rois - forgot to tell you, I had my hair cut, and in typical Niamh style, tried to go for something adventurous and it just ended up looking like a messy version of the haircut I already have...when will I ever get a good haircut...you need to teach me!

Love you x

Hi Rois and James, I'm back on so that only means one thing Nana is back in Carrick on Shannon! We've just had a lovely half hour looking through the photos of your mum and dad's trip down under. A few things that surprised us - that you got noons so close to those furry creatures and that your dad got into that steep railway ride!!!! but the photos of the cocktails and icecreams convinced us that there hadn't been any personality transplants in the land of oz. Hope your travels are going well.

Jim, Diarmuid and Seamus away in Dublin for the day at the "Toys for big boys" show - Does exactly as it says on the tin!! Was at "Boy in the striped pyjamas" last night - brillaint and thought provoking movie - I'd recommend it to anyone who can catch it. Nana and I down in Lough Key Forest Park for walk this afternoon but we didn't manage to get as far as the biggest tree in the world.

take care of yourselves

love from Granny, CG and gang

Message just received from Uncle Richard in Basingstoke......

I said I would keep a lookout for you re possible jobs…………….word has it that there is a good opportunity at Vicarage Road. I understand that although very well paid, can lead to stress and not likely to last long if results are not achieved………getting above Southampton being the main objective. Contact Elton John for further info….although I think he might well have gone now.

Need I say more......

Morning! Just been through the photos - fantastic!! But James, the hair.....what is going on mate.....and the sideburns.......get them under control! Particularly interesting of course were the two photos of a tall tree......and I believe James was probably thinking of rabbit Millie when he was stroking the wallaby and koala; hope you're not missing her too much (good news is that Mr G. Pig is now back outside, bad news is that she's still living!!).

Seriously, the photos are lovely. The Ocean Road looks like a must for the future. Good to see what a great time you're having including Mum & Dad McG - trip of a lifetime!

Got your mail this morning, thanks for the update. All well here and a miracle this morning of a slither of blue sky after days of cloud!

Take care, love from us all.......