Matt & Kat

It’s been a while since our last update here. Life’s been good. We’ve been setting up our new home in London, returning home for family celebrations, watching Olympics, and enjoying long summer days filled with park walks, swims, BBQs and picnics. We arrived in London mid May and stayed in a temporary apartment in central London while we got settled and started looking for a permanent home. It took several weeks to get our bearings, decide on an area we liked and hunt down the ideal house.

See Full Post...

We’re on the final countdown till our trip home. This will be Micah’s first time in New Zealand, his first time meeting all of his aunties, uncles and other adoring fans. To say I’m looking forward to it would be a mammoth understatement. I. Can’t. Wait!!!!!! Currently writing lists, packing suitcases for three, and planning baby travel logistics. Just barely containing the excitement. We fly out on Saturday, spend one week in the US where Matt will be visiting Google HQ for work, then fly into Auckland on Nov 20th.

See Full Post...

Since well before we arrived in Europe, Turkey has been near the top of our “must visit” list. It’s a very interesting country in terms of landscapes, history, food and culture – oh and history, did I mention history? There’s a lot of it there! Turkey is also a huge place and we were faced with difficult decisions choosing which parts of the country to see! In the end we opted for quite a well worn tourist track from Istanbul down the western coast via Gallipoli, Ephesus and Pamukkale before finishing with a relaxing week in a small resort town called Kalkan.

See Full Post...

Last weekend was a bank holiday here in Dublin, so we took an extra day off and had a 4 day weekend in Norway. Scandinavia has been on our todo list for a while and given that we haven’t managed to visit any new countries yet this year it seemed like a good time to see a new place. We had an enjoyable weekend in Oslo, although when they say that Norway is one of the more expensive euro countries to travel to they’re not joking!

See Full Post...

We’ve been in Mountain View for 2 weeks now and I’m enjoying many things about life here, especially the warm sunny days and the wealth of fresh food available at the weekend market and the local Whole Foods store. I’d forgotten what fresh veges should be like after so long shopping from Dublin supermarkets. Everything seems to grow bigger and brighter and tastier here as well as lasting much longer (coz its local and fresh!

See Full Post...

Happy Easter everyone. I hope your long weekend was well-stocked with chocolate goodies, plenty of relax time and some quiet moments to reflect on the reason behind the holiday. Matt and I spent this Easter visiting Donegal, in the north-west of Ireland. It was great to get out of the city, see some beautiful natural landscapes and breath in the fresh country air. We stayed at Coxtown Manor near Donegal town, a charming place nestled in the country amid spring daffodils and frolicking lambs.

See Full Post...

We’re back in NZ right now and will be here till the end of the year. It’s wonderful to be home and spend some quality time with family, see old friends and enjoy cafes and places we haven’t been in ages. We arrived into NZ on Oct 27th – nearly 3 weeks ago already and we’ve been pretty busy since then with family and friends to see, a wedding to help with and some house hunting too.

See Full Post...

Last week in Zurich was nice and relaxing. I enjoyed sleeping in and spending afternoons visiting different places in the city. I visited a Museum of Design one day and the Zurich zoo on another. I wandered around the old city and browsed the shops a lot. Zurich seemed very orderly and very expensive. The people there were generally quite reserved. Nobody smiled on the tram and most people are quite unwilling to speak English.

See Full Post...

Ever since we booked our cruise holiday in January I’ve been eagerly awaiting May 29th, excited to flee the grey cold weather of Dublin and cruise the Caribbean in style with our fabulous friends Kieron, Lucy, Joey and Robbie. There was so much packed into our holiday last week that I don’t know where to begin in describing it. Lets just say it was 9 days of fabulousness! Memories of our tropical sunny holiday will keep me warm through the Irish ‘summer’ 😛

See Full Post...

Thursday morning saw us make an early start from Avignon as we tried to fit in a quick trip to Carcassonne to see the walled city that one of our favourite board games is named after before catching our train to Barcelona from Montpellier in the early afternoon, a total of roughly 400km of driving. Thanks to the French motorway system and the generous 130km/h speed limit we managed this in just under 4 hours which gave us just enough time for a quick visit and a few photos in Carcassonne itself!

See Full Post...