Blog Update – London part 1 and Malta

Bye Bye New York – we loved ya!  Thanks to Rebecca and Max for lending us their luverly apartment. It had great views over the Hudson River and Jase had a few mornings jogging along the river bank, which I kept promising I would do too and never got around to.  Got enough exercise walking Manhattan instead.

Highs of New York (in no particular order):

• -          Getting cool and groovy in the funky Zebra Room in Harlem’s Lennox Lounge;
  
• -          Spending time with the lovely Ben, a most charming and generous host (who, if I can return to my favourite theme – food (Ben’s too I think!!) – took us to Hill Country restaurant to savour traditional Texas BBQ.  Being a Texas lad he was eager to show off his State’s specialty in the best Texas restaurant in NYC.  “But Aussies do the best BBQ” I hear you scoff.  Well let me tell ya – I have never had BBQ meat as DELICIOUSLY tasty, tender and yummy as they do it down the Lone Star way, complete with ranch style baked beans (I gotta get me a recipe) and fluffy sweet corn mash, pecan pie….Ah, I drool remembering it.)
  
• -          Riding the traditional old Carousel horses in Central Park
  
• -          Wandering through Central Park
  
• -          Friendly courteous people wherever we went
  
• -          Slices of mushroom pizza
  
• -          Hmmmm, what else? Just being in New York I guess.
  
• -          Jase will no doubt go on about all the jazz gigs he went to and famous musos he heard,  rubbed shoulders with and chatted to (James Carter; Louis Hayes; Craig Handy; Fred Lebayle (maker of mouthpieces); Marcus Strickland )– of which probably only Alf and Dave will be impressed as I’m sure the rest of you out there share my total ignorance of these talents!
  

 

London Part 1 

We had a quick 2 day pit stop in London on our way to Malta to catch one of the rare sightings of Uncle Paul at Ham Common.  We all had a wonderful time catching up with Uncle Paul and Aunty Chris and Grandad.  The girls got a little confused in all the family relationships and kept calling Uncle Paul and Aunty Chris “Grandad” and “Grandma” too! (A reflection on how happily they all got along). He taught them some magic in Grandad’s room – wiping off a rainbow prism reflection with just his hanky and the magic words “Abracadabra, Isaac Azimba, Zimba Zee! Mange mina lo ngango!” (or was it nganga?? – something like that - I guess only true magicians know).  The girls were suitably amazed!  They loved meeting Grandad and kept him busy doing monster spider impressions and practising lobbing rolled up balls of plastic wrap into a copper cup – and I can report that Grandad still has a good eye, getting a few in and only Just missing others!

Uncle Paul took us on safari to Richmond Park where we successfully crept upon some deer for Jason to  photograph  (getting into practice for Africa one day!!)

Malta

Well we managed to get to Malta on EasyJet (only just – almost missed the flight, thanks to Jason mooching around looking at magazines in the airport shops until after the plane was boarding, so despite having checked in the night before in order to secure priority boarding for unassigned seats, we ended up being the last people to board the flight!!  Luckily a kind gent offered up his and his (older) daughter’s seats so that at least the girls and I could sit together in a row of 3.

 

We were met at Malta airport by a large party of Josephine’s family who had kindly come out to meet us.  (And the girls were introduced to the confusing array of the Aunty Marys!)  Uncle Tony and Aunty Mary looked after us splendidly, kindly driving us around to several destinations. Valletta was beautiful - we loved the steep, narrow, stone streets (even though they were murder on the legs), overhung with balconies and box windows and a church on every other street and a shrine built into every street corner.  The Grand Harbour was so beautiful and we were lucky enough to be staying very close to it so could admire the view from the top of the cliff over the harbour to the 3 cities each day.  Discovered a lovely little café to sip a beer or hot choccie of an evening, overlooking the lovely view as it sunk into dusk and the evening lights began to twinkle on the other side of the water. 

We managed to catch up with most of Josephine’s side of the family, either individually or at a lovely family dinner we all went to at a nice hotel in Paceville – where little cousin Emma did a splendid job in entertaining and corralling our increasingly excitable and out of control kids. (By the end of our stay we were quite ready to leave them in Malta).  I think our favourite spot, besides the lovely harbour views, was the ancient little citadel of Mdina, where we spent a nice afternoon wandering around with Aunty Marie and Uncle John.  The girls couldn’t get enough of her and kept calling her “Nanna”!

We also went to visit (another) Aunty Mary – Jason’s paternal aunty this time and cousins Valhmor, Sandro and Jesmond. It was a nice evening followed by a follow-up lunch and the day spent with Valhmor, Mary-Grace and Aunty Mary later in the week.

 

All in all we enjoyed spending time with Jason’s extended family and were very grateful for all their efforts and hospitality!

 

We enjoyed Malta and just managed to fit-in some sightseeing as well as family get togethers at a rather hectic pace! The only failure of the trip was our visit to Gozo when the morning sunshine quickly turned into early afternoon showers and we had to abandon the Gozo streets in favour of a nice Gozo pub! The photos give an indication of the girls’ reaction to the rain and cold! So the Gozo trip was 4 hrs travel (return) to achieve only 2 wet hours in Gozo!

 

‘Saha’ to Malta for now and ‘Kafinti’ yee olde England…and the next round of family get togethers…