Huntingdon House Hotel Dumfries

Well I was all set to leave, my brother arrived to pick me up and told me that my father had passed away that morning. Devastating news. Rang Real Gap straight away and they were really good about everything. Have postponed trip until after the funeral which is this Friday.

Will update when I have details of my flights and my new itinerary.

... affair. This is good though, as the next time I am here will be on the day of my last injections - which is also day before I depart - so there will be precious little time for social arrangements.

This evening marked precisely 2 weeks to departure - awesome! XD

Think I've packed up everything in the house now, feels weird without the cats being here. I think that's one of the toughest things I've ever had to do. I hope they go to a good home....

Sold the car and rented out the flat and packed my life into a box. Strange feeling.

It's the start of a new chapter ...

... in between times. Eventually about 30 mins before due to leave the board changed from 'waiting' to 'last call'. Nothing in between and it was a long way to the gate so a lot of middle aged women were panicking - and hadn't quite got it that the flight doesn't leave without lots of announcements that your luggage will be offloaded if you haven't got to the gate.

Once on, I was lucky enough to be asked to move into an empty emergency ...

we arrived at Heathrow at about 5am which was bloody early even for us plus it was cold. It was pretty uneventful and delivered us safely to Doha.

We stayed in Doha airport for around 3.5 hours, bought some cheap fags (which were rubbish) the highlight being, there was a smoking room. A proper Opium den ...

... a belsejet is, 46 agyu volt rajta, es asszem 300 embert zsufoltak bele. Megneztuk a fedelzetet, a kapitanyi kabint, az agyukat, a matrozok, vagyis katonak “szallashelyet”, a tisztek kabinjait, a tarolokat, loporraktarat, stb.Aztan elmentunk a masik szepseghez, ez nekem sokkal jobban tetszett, a Discovery. Lilla ebbe mar nem jott be, hanem helyette elment megkeresni a Tax Office-t, hogy vmi adokedvezmenyrol erdeklodjon. A Discovery az elso olyan brit hajo volt ...

... volt, regen rendor volt, es szeretnem minden kedves gyanakvo honfitarsamnak felhivni a figyelmet arra, hogy nem mindenki gonosz, van aki valoban joszandekbol segit az arratevedo turistaknak! J Aztan Perth-ben elmentem meg a J.D.Fergusson galeriaba, denem neztem vegig, mert sietni akartam, hogy meg aterjek a "B" betus botanikus kertbe a folyo masik oldalan, persze igy is egy oraval elobb ertem oda a buszhoz, mindegy , majd legkozelebb meg visszamegyek a galeriaba ...

... to drive past a nasty motor cycle accident which was almost certainly a fatal one. The later were here for the Appleby Fair, when they get together to sell, buy and ride Horses, have a few fights to settle things and generally scare the **** out of middle England. We went past tons of beautiful horse drawn caravans, and the mood was one of fun, not intimidating in any way.
Gretna Green, Scotland, United Kingdom darrenstravels

... We went to the National Picture Gallery & the British Museum today. They weren't too bad to have a look at. We saw Cleopatra's mummy & lots of other old artifacts. We went to Leicester Square & Covent Garden for a look around. We felt like we were playing Monopoly, you can do a Monopoly pub crawl, we are saving that for next time!! 25/11 - First thing today we went down to Harrods London. Amazing place, you may as well just leave your wallet at home cause you ...

... back roads to Balmaclellan, where John, his wife Margaret Grierson and his son Robert are supposed to be buried. We found the village and the churchyard but no sign of any McCaws. There were some Grierson graves, one followed by Esq. So I figured that must be descendants of Margaret as she was daughter or granddaughter of an Earl. Still, left somewhat disappointed and hoping for more luck at the next place - Tynron. Many more back roads later, we arrived at a little town ...