Summer 2023 

July 2023 – 2 September 2023

By the time it came around, it felt like we literally fell across the end-of-school line. The kids were spent. They had survived their first term of school in the UK, made their first friends, and played their first season of cricket. 

The exam results were in, and the marks had been remarkable. Other than Ellie’s disappointing ‘Did not complete’ for Latin (having studied for approximately 4 weeks v the other girls’ several years), their results, considering the highly disrupted year, were excellent and we were really proud. 

The club cricket season also ended on a high, with all 3 girls winning their respective league competitions, and Ellie doing well in her first couple of games in county cricket. Anthony also got out for a few games throughout the summer, playing on some beautiful grounds and dealing with the shock of playing against people who were less than 40.

In addition to playing, we were being spoiled with the best womens and mens Ashes Series on record, and had been fortunate enough to have tickets for 2 days of the Lords Test and Women’s T20 matches at the Oval and Lords. The experience of sitting watching the first 2 days of the Lord’s Ashes Test, surrounded by a crowd tucking into their gourmet picnics and to the tune of champagne corks popping was particularly memorable! 

Jessie’s term at Broomwood had been a great success – making friends, passing her exams, (after a total of 12 weeks schooling across both Year 5 and Year 6), acting in a fantastic rendition of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, being runner up in the Surrey Girls Cricket Championship, enjoying her first 3 day school trip to France, and taking the time to bash out some wonderful digital art.

Unfortunately, despite our attachment to Broomwood – both the experience it had given Jess and the families we had met there – we had to say goodbye to the school at the end of term and orient our lives to the south east and the promise of having all 3 girls at one school from September. The tears on the last day were as sad as they were inevitable (although Liz won’t miss the 3 hour daily commutes). 

Sena was settling in well at school too – for her we had found Sydenham prep to be really supportive and she was doing a great job making friends and catching up with the 6 months of school she had missed in our journey over here. 

For Ellie, we were finding the truth in our concern that moving a teenager midway through year 8 was going to be tougher. 13 year old girls don’t just smile at each other across the playground to make friends, and the transition simply wasn’t as easy as it was for the younger kids. Sure, the academic jump was bigger, but bigger than that was the social jump of landing in a new school midway through a year and needing to connect with a new group of girls. We were navigating through the academics – and her end of year results showed great progress on this front – but finding good friends and recreating her Sydney social life was proving challenging as we went into summer – this would take more than the first couple of months. 

We were already feeling the benefits of living in a city that people visited. Over the last few months, we had hosted the Macleans on the London leg of their European adventures (we would see them more fulsomely in Paris in a few weeks) and had also had the opportunity to catch up with some European friends like Matty when he came to town, and of course London friends like Krista and Dave, Gidon, Helen and Martyn and Marky and Claire. Further visits were planned by Adam and Michele, Jo and other friends post summer – something that is just so much easier from here due to the shorter distances involved.

On the housing front, our lease finished up in Honor Oak just after school drew to a close on 11 July. Despite being nestled as it was on top of the train line (only 20 trains per hour for 16 hours per day), we had enjoyed staying there – it was absolutely our ‘port in a storm’ of what would have otherwise been an even more disruptive and incredibly expensive chaos. It was big enough to host numerous cousin sleepovers, convenient to school and work and with just enough going on in the area to keep us sane. Whilst it always felt temporary (the camping chairs around the kitchen table ensured that we never felt fully settled there), we still felt some nostalgia when we decamped with all our stuff to a combination of Rosie’s garage, a friend’s house in Clapham and the back of our Peugeot. 

Over the next 5 weeks we would be living out of a bags; jumping from house to house every couple of days before eventually landing in our new place in East Dulwich in mid August. We would move some 13 times as we travelled by train around France and car around the UK. The girls would be able to see some new sights, retrace some steps and have some different experiences, Anthony would be working from a variety of temporary accommodation. This slightly enforced tour would give everyone an interesting holiday experience – and the opportunity to see some great sights across multiple countries – and avoid paying ridiculous costs for long term accommodation in London over summer. Whilst this looked good on paper – and was wonderful in many respects in practice – we probably didn’t anticipate the extent to which the whole family needed a base over this period to process the 4 months that had come before. We didn’t realise that this was a hole that needed to be filled until we eventually filled it when we moved into our new place in mid August. But I’m getting ahead of myself. 

Our first stop after leaving Honor Oak was a beautiful house in Clapham offered to us by the parents of one of Jessie’s friends who were off on holidays for a month. We had decluttered our lives and were now travelling with what we would carry to France, plus an additional bag for our road trip around the UK. 

For the first few days of holidays, the kids were total zombies.They were so exhausted after the last few months that they literally couldn’t string a sentence together. They basically sat in a darkened room and rocked. Much to their chagrin, we soon had to pull them moving again for the French part of our holiday adventures. 

Our French itinerary was to take in both Paris and house sitting in Aix for a week. We had decided to leave Bonnie at home, and had arranged for him to be looked after by a sitter through a dog sitting platform over here. Our first choice sitter turned out to be a fail (as our ‘security consultant’ sitter appeared to be a cross between a drug dealer and counter espionage agent who lived in a blacked out flat in the middle of nowhere, surrounded only by security cameras); luckily our replacement option turned out to be 2 lovely women living in a dog friendly high rise overlooking Battersea Power Station. 

Confident that Bonnie was going to receive an appropriate level of love and cuddles, we made our way to St Pancreas, bought a large bottle of rose for the crossing, and we were off on the Eurostar to Paris. 

We had a really fun long weekend with the Macleans, wandering the streets, eating, drinking and catching up. It was great to be able to spend some time with them on their European adventures, and lovely to be travelling again with the kids, reminding them of one of the many things that are so good about living on this side of the world.

There’s also nothing quite like sitting down for dinner with good friends in a cosy Paris restaurant (Brasserie Bellanger on Rue du Faulbourg Poissonniere – so good!)

On the last day there, we even got a rare glimpse of a couple of Campbell ladies at the train station. 

Following our 4 days in Paris, we made our way south on the TGV to Aix – where we had a lovely night catching up with Claire, JM, Amael and Ysalis, before spending the next week looking after Ryder and their cats, and enjoying their beautiful home in the centre of the city.

It was awesome to be back in Aix, reminding the kids of the life we had there, and seeing them re-engage with the French language and culture (read: food). After spending time in France and seeing videos of themselves speaking French in 2020, the girls are now back to weekly French lessons to try and emulate their 10 and 8 year old selves. So far progress has been positive, but there is a reasonable sized gap still to fill. 

Our week in France was HOT – 37 degrees most days – and we kept things pretty simple. Most days started at the market, Liz and the kids spent time around Aix whilst Anthony worked. In addition to seeing Claire and JM, we also got to catch up with Corey and Mathias which was great as well. On the weekend we all went to Lac Peyrolles on Friday evening, and Bandol for the day on Saturday. Mostly we just ate, hung out and took advantage of the pool.

Before long the week was done and it was time to head back to London and on to Scotland for the next stage of our summer pilgrimage. We had a quick night in London to fetch a quite confused Bonnie (his facial expression described something about high rise living, old dogs and new tricks) and repacked before an early start and a long drive up to Blebocraig, just outside St Andrews in Fife. 

The house Liz had booked was amazing – on rural land with a wonderful aspect and plenty of space to cook, hangout, work and go for walks in wonderful surroundings. We spent the first few days doing exactly that, with maybe some chess games whilst sitting in the beautiful window ‘nook’ in the lounge room and family movie nights thrown in. Sena discovered a passion for haggis that surprised us all – although she continues to be blissfully unawares as to its ingredients. 

Midway through the week Anthony disappeared to Glasgow for a 2 day partner offsite (including several fun nights out and a wonderful trip on Loch Lomond), whilst the girls spent their time exploring Edinburgh….

St Andrews and Anstruther…..

and the the Glasgow Science Centre including planetarium which was a huge hit!

We had plans to head into the highlands for the weekend, but the distances were a bit long so we ‘settled’ for a wonderful ‘walk’ (read: carrying Bonnie up all the stairs) around some waterfalls at Maspie Den a bit closer to home in Fife.

Following our waterfall trip, we headed to the beautiful fishing village of Elie for a great fish and chip lunch at the Ship Inn – and to watch the world famous/only Ship Inn beach cricket team play a visiting eleven from Edinburgh. This was beach cricket like we’d never seen before – complete with boundary ropes, marked out pitch, scoreboards and commentary team… not to mention the complementary beers for players. Inspired by the cricket and impervious to the temperature, Bonnie also wound back the years and went for a canter and a swim at the beach. 

On Sunday we spent the day exploring the St Andrews golf course (somewhat unsuccessfully trying to get the kids interested in golfing history)

and then the Highland Games in St Andrews where we were slightly fixated by the caber toss (which looks really hard in practice) and hammer throwing. We also searched in vain for highland cows, but settled for a t-shirt in lieu of the real thing. 

Not even the unpredictable Scottish summer weather could dampen our week in Scotland – we all really loved it and plan on spending a bit more time here next summer. 

As if the weather wasn’t bad enough in Scotland (it wasn’t really; it rained most days, but was sunny more than it rained) our next stop was Lancaster – chosen because it was on the way as we headed south, and had a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The performance was put on by a travelling troupe called The HandleBards, who cycle the country with all that they need for their stage. We literally knew nothing about the city other than that. 

It turns out that Lancaster has a reputation for being a university town, and for raining all the time. It delivered on both.

There was more or less no one there (university being on holiday) and the only time it stopped raining was during the hilarious performance of the play, which was staged outside in the grounds of the beautiful Lancaster Castle. Being a 4 person travelling show, Liz even got hauled up on stage at one point to be someone’s bride (much to Anthony’s concern). The show was hilarious and the actors were incredibly talented and engaging – it was brilliant to see the girls getting into the show.

From rainy Lancaster, we made our way down to the Cotswolds for a couple of nights and a performance of The Great Gatsby….

and so the kids could see the overly touristy Stratford Upon Avon,

the beautiful Cotswolds villages including Upper and Lower Slaughter, and pick strawberries (all while Anthony stayed at ‘home’ working with Bonnie, trying to protect him from the local farm dogs). 

From there it was on to Center Parcs in Longleat, near Salisbury for a 4 day weekend with Jeff, Izabela and the cousins, where we got to spend a couple of days on the waterslides, riding bikes and playing on ziplines with Jeff and the kids – definitely a big hit with everyone. 

A quick trip to Salisbury Cathedral on the way home and we headed back to London, excited that we would only have a few more days before we got the keys to our very own ‘real home’. We were incredibly grateful for having had access to such wonderful hospitality over the last few weeks, but couldn’t wait to see our own (mostly rubbish, aged and dirty Ikea) stuff that we hadn’t seen for the last 5 months. 

That Friday we got the keys to our new place, back in East Dulwich where we bought our first piece of real estate some 20 years ago. It was not the plan to move back here, but we found a lovely house (albeit a lot smaller than what we were used to in Australia) and the location works really well between Sydenham High and London Bridge. First impressions are that we love the proximity to public transport, the restaurants and bars, the shops, the park and the kids sporting clubs (cricket, netball and hockey are all just around the corner). We can centralise and simplify their lives – which will hopefully help them settle. 

What we did notice was that, immediately after the frantic unpacking of stuff that follows any move, that everyone took a deep breath and seemed to settle a bit after the last 6 months of excitement, uncertainty and change. It’s amazing how having your own stuff around you can be so grounding (or perhaps it was the fact that we didn’t have any internet that meant we all got a chance to stop, reflect and meditate a bit!) (NB: 3 weeks later we still don’t have any sign of entering the digital age). 

Liz and the girls then had almost 2 weeks to sit still in London before we headed off again for our actual ‘holiday’ to Greece. They spent this time getting settled into the new house, and (finally!) getting into central London and having the chance to sight see a bit with trips to the Tate Modern, Brick Lane (courtesy of a tour by Krista!), Southbank and around Victoria. It was nice for the girls to actually realise that there’s more to London than school and cricket fields across the south east. The girls got used to jumping on a bus (slow but effective) to go literally door to door from our new house to Covent Garden; they began to realise the breadth of London shopping, and finally got to see some shows (Wicked with a special girls lunch and The Choir of Man with cousin Gidon). 

Like the rest of our time here, this short period of normality went past in a second, and before we knew it we were heading back to Gatwick for another flight – this time to Athens and ultimately on to Santorini for a week in the sun with Alan and Ana. 

After a surprisingly efficient Gatwick experience and a delayed, but almost inexplicably pleasant Easyjet flight, Athens was amazing. Predictably hot but not unbearably so, we ate our body weight in BBQ goodness, bonded with the incredibly friendly Athenians, marvelled at the Acropolis in the early morning sunshine (well before the tidal wave of tourists hit at 9am), and enjoyed the excellent Acropolis Museum and fun food markets. We balanced ‘just enough’ culture and sightseeing to have the kids enjoy the experience, with enough downtime to mitigate any risk of mutiny. 

The second night we were there we got to celebrate Liz’s birthday from a wonderful rooftop bar overlooking the Acropolis (not a difficult thing to do, as apparently building heights in Athens are kept low so that you can see Acropolis from lots of places) and a great dinner together. 

The following day we were up at 4.30am (read: 2.30am London time = broken children) to get back to the airport for our short flight to Santorini (Anthony did not get his way when pushing for the boat ride across). Ryanair decided to charge us 300 euros to check in, which was a new and delightful feature of flying with them. When we protested, we were met with a half hearted, classically Greek shrug ‘I would love to help you, but it’s out of my hands’ (in this case, no doubt this was fact). We paid our money and wrote an angry letter, receiving a ‘shrug’ emoji in response. It’s good to know that Ryanair hasn’t changed in the 15 years since we have flown them, it’s only that stuff ups are now more expensive as we have to times any extra fees or changes by 5! 

We landed in Santorini and were greeted by the beautiful blue waters and arid, mountainous landscape.

We made our way to the car rental place, and were informed that the cost of our car would be another 150 euros to what was previously agreed (accompanied by another highly  apologetic Greek shrug ‘it’s out of my hands’.) This was turning out to be an expensive morning! 

We picked up our overpriced, black Nissan people mover and made our way gingerly out into the winding Santorini roads, marvelling that such a car was still considered roadworthy. Anthony was pining for his Peugeot, or any car with any kind of driver assistance features like proximity sensors, rear cameras or adequate tyres to help him navigate the ‘roads’ on the island. The view that we may as well just burn our 900 euro excess on the BBQ that night was only enhanced when we were met by our host and asked to follow her down a series of mountain hugging donkey tracks to get to our accommodation. 

Fortunately the villa was as spectacular as it was difficult to get to, with wonderful views over the eastern part of the island to the sea beyond, enough space to spread out and a beautiful infinity pool and BBQ. We immediately started planning menus and matching wine lists. Over the course of the week, Anthony swallowed his pride and came to terms with his Nissan people mover, not to mention the mountainous goat paths that pass for roads around the island. 

On the first day we were here we got to catch up with Rozelle, Dan and their boys who were at the end of their 2 month Mediterranean adventure.

Later that evening Alan and Ana arrived, and for the next 5 days graciously endured entertaining our girls and sharing our holiday with us. 

Santorini is not a small island – it would take about an hour to drive north-south. Some 3500 years ago it was much bigger, but then half of it was blown up in 1600 BC when a local volcano erupted, destroying the Minoan cities here and leaving a stunning bay and now crescent shaped landmass. It is dry and windy, and a lot of it is covered in small, thirsty looking vines from which they make a tasty, slightly salty white wine. The beaches are rocky and mostly black sand or pebbles, with beautiful warm water (at least at this time of year). The island is really famous for its amazing architecture, with beautiful white houses and blue domed churches clinging to the cliffs overlooking the sea. It’s beaches (such as they exist – a lot of the coastline is cliffs) are rocky and either black or red, depending on the rock that formed them. This unique architecture and natural beauty has meant that it is now famous for honeymooners and instagrammers. For us it is famous because Liz has a painting of it that has been hanging in our house for as long as anyone can remember. There are almost no kids here – I think with our 3 we have double the number of children on the island. 

We have spent our time at a number of the beaches (which would be fair to middling by Mediterranean standards), wine tasting at Gaia, hanging out by our pool and cooking amazing meals, going diving and letting the kids try waterskiing and wakeboarding.

The Wine Bar in Imerovigli.

We have explored the interesting capital, Fira and the uniquely beautiful but crazy Oia. Oia at sunset is ‘the place’ to get all dressed up, take a photo like you’re there by yourself (watched by 500 other people) and post it on Instagram. We have never seen so much effort getting put into clothes, hair and makeup to go for a sunset walk through a village. A seat at a sunset bar will cost you 60 euros per person minimum spend; we managed to get some roadies, perch on a stone wall and enjoy the same view for 7 euros each (and the excellent Lazy Donkey beer). 

On our last full day here, after Alan and Ana had left, we took a boat out to the still active volcano and climbed up (much to the nervous protests of Jessie and Sienna), before cooling off in the beautiful Mediterranean water; and experiencing some volcanically heated warm sea pools.

We also finally got around to the Lost Atlantis Experience – interactive museum with 9D rendition of the volcanic explosiong that for some was in fact the destruction of Atlantis – complete with 3D glasses, bubbles, moving seats and sprays of water to emulate the tsunami. A definite must!

We understand that Alan and Ana spent the day asleep, no doubt recovering from our kids’ craziness.

For our last night, we left the kids at home and went up to the beautiful village of Pyrgus to have a final drink whilst watching a stunning sunset turn the white churches and houses gold. 

Like all holidays, this one is going way too fast, and before long we will be back on the plane and heading back to London. We’ve enjoyed the hiatus from ‘real life’ that the last couple of months have given us – the kids really needed it – and they’re probably as ready for the next chapter as they ever will be. 

The kids are a bit nervous to go back to school. Transitioning is not easy and we’re not done with it yet. Sena is excited to see her friends, Ellie is less convinced about heading back and into year 9, Jessie is nervous about starting another school (again). At least this time they will all be together, it will be just down the road, and will have a home to come back to. 

In preparation for the new school year, each one of them is pulling together a SMART template of goals (yes, mummy and daddy are consultants) for the next 8 weeks, that will be assessed in October half terms, and rewarded with a shopping trip, or not, for successful achievement. The goal scope includes academic effort, participation in competitive and non competitive school sport, extra curricular participation and efforts to socialise and make friends. In all cases, the emphasis will be on effort not outcomes – we’re not total monsters after all. 

All the non school extra curricular activities are about to kick off again now too. Country trials for all 3 girls will run through September, then the 12+ month cricket season will finally draw to a close and they get a break until January. Even Anthony agrees that a break is welcome. Hockey and netball will take its place, but not at the same level of intensity, and will hopefully leave room for us to do some weekend trips around the UK, or at least continue to explore some of the great things that London has to offer. 

We’re also busy planning our travel adventures for the next year or so (you have to get in early over here). On the list are a trip to Amsterdam, ski trips to France and Switzerland, a quick, adults only Northern Lights trip (sorry kids!), Egypt and Israel for Easter, and Ibiza and the Balkans for summer. We are super excited to be retracing some of our previous steps with the kids, and also exploring some new destinations. 

I was saying at the end of school that the end of term felt like the ‘end of the beginning’ for our time over here. The last few months have felt like a bit of a step out of reality – especially for the girls. Liz has done an incredible job curating a set of diverse and interesting experiences out of what could have been absolute chaos. 

Now it feels like the beginning of ‘normal’ – which is probably exactly what we need. Between now and Christmas it feels like ‘boring is beautiful’ – we are looking forward to being able to have some weekends to ourselves, to focus on getting settled at school and work, to solidifying nascent friendships and having people over for dinner, to getting the girls to know and love where they live before the cold wet weather and shorter days kick in.