September 2023 – February 2024

So it’s now end of March, which means it’s now a year since we left Australia, 11 months into London and five sixths of a school year done. 

Zooming back out now to the last few months in London…. And so much has happened that we’re going to have to keep things pretty brief, and let the pictures do the talking! 

Jessie moved from Broomwood to Sydenham High in September to start Year 7, meaning that all the girls are now in the same school, and no more daily commuting across to Clapham. The simplicity of having all 3 girls together, and just 10 mins from home can’t be overstated. 

We had more than our share of going back to school nerves (with the exception of Sena, who was counting down the days before school went back). Ellie had not found the Summer term easy going and so was worried about going back, and Jessie was experiencing some ‘new school/high school’ jitters. Ultimately both Ellie and Jessie made a good start to the year, which was a relief. 

Our plan for the next few months was to keep things simple. Let the kids ‘just go to school’ for the 4 months until Christmas, not plan too many trips and spend our cricket-free weekends exploring London. That was the theory, but, after a couple of blissfully quiet weekends in early September, our diary started to slowly fill up again. 

Firstly there was the expected ‘back to school’ orientations and socials – both for the kids and us. Jessie went off for a couple of days to Surrey to climb up and jump off things with her new school mates. We went to a number of different parent evenings, social nights and cocktail parties – meeting a number of fun and interesting parents in the process. 

What we were finding, however, is that London is like Sydney. Great people are everywhere, they’re just really busy. Like us. So when a fun initial meeting tries to convert into a repeat affair, you’re generally waiting for weeks and months between catch ups – which makes building close friendships challenging. 

September saw the start of winter sports – netball and hockey for Ellie, just netball for Jessie and Sienna. It was also the time for Kent Country trials for Ellie and Jessie – both making the Metropolitan Area Squad, and Ellie making the U15 County ‘Red Caps’ team. This would see them training throughout winter – including fairly regular trips to Canterbury. Liz was ecstatic. 

Hockey has been an interesting discovery for Ellie – it’s been good for her to play a game that she hasn’t been learning for the last 5+ years, and one that she’s not very ‘good’ at. This is quite an unusual situation for her to be in, and one that is interesting to watch. As of late winter she is still persevering. 

In the middle of September, Liz headed over to Aix for the weekend for Claire’s belated 50th birthday party. She came back with her emotional cup refilled, a bag full of wine and Aixoise snackies.

Shortly after that, Adam, Michele, Alex and Zoe came to stay for a couple of weeks, using our place to explore London and surrounds. It was lovely to be able to hang out with them and head out for the occasional dinner. One particular highlight was a ‘Dad’s only’ trip to Chessington World of Adventure with the kids – and seeing the dads have as much fun as the kids on the various roller coasters and other rides. 

Adam and Michele’s trip was capped off by the social event of the year – Sienna’s 9th birthday party, which also coincided with Michele and Alex Orelle being in town with their 3 boys (or were they in town for Sena’s birthday? Who can tell?).

As September rolled into October the weather stayed warm and dry. The only thing that indicated that summer was over was the (somewhat) shortening days, and the leaves starting to turn on the trees. In early October we had temperatures in the mid 20s. Unheard of in London – maybe winter wouldn’t be so bad. Right? 

We were staying true to our strategy and making the most of being in London. Visits to Buckingham Palace for their ‘open house’, Battersea  Power Station (an absolute favourite) and Little Venice/Camden kept us busy, as the girls discovered that there was more to London than school and cricket fields. 

We had just got into the flow of being back at school when holidays came around again. These kids are literally never more than a month away from a holiday. It’s insane. For the October half terms (2 weeks!) we decided to stay put. Liz and the girls put the hard yards in around London with numerous day trips. Afterall, whilst the kids may have 14 weeks holiday a year, Ant only has 6, so we need to economise somewhere. 

Then the rain started – particularly in the south of the country which had 2 named storms hit in quick succession, delivering record rainfall to the Isle of Wight in the week exactly leading up to our planned visit to see Alix and Gilly McKee. We braved the flooded roads and soggy fields to spend a lovely weekend down on the island. It was great for Liz to be able to catch up with Alix after 10+ years, and nice to be able to explore a new area of the UK (albeit one which probably wasn’t at it’s best when we were there). We promised to return in summer! 

Blink again and we’re in November, but not without first celebrating Halloween in a full costumed assault on south London. Ellie disappeared off to Brixton wearing a little black dress and mouse ears (it’s testament of how Brixton has changed since we were last here that she made it back in one piece), we stayed closer to home around Court Lane, largely because Ant’s large purple Grimmace like outfit would not fit on public transport! 

We spent a fun weekend in Battle for Guy Fawkes night – exploring the Battle of Hastings (just as Jessie was doing this at school) and, of course, the Gunpowder plot and story of Guy Fawkes.  

The spectacular autumn leaves were now mostly wet on the ground, having turned Dulwich orange and red for the last month or so. It is now noticeably darker and colder. We started to switch gears and focus on indoor activities – heading to Les Miserable with Ellie (absolutely wonderful) and Six as a family (also great, and a lot shorter!). 

By the end of the month it is really dark and absolutely freezing, -5 degrees for a week or so. The kids are looking concerned – what the hell have you gotten us into? 

We start to talk up ‘London at Christmas time’ and remind them that we’ll be off skiing in just 6 short weeks. We took advantage of some beautiful, cold, crisp days to make day trips to Greenwich, the City and Saint Pauls. Ant starting exploring new areas of London on foot on the weekend, particularly areas around Hyde Park and Regent’s Park. 

And then there was school. Compared to what were used to in Australia, the workload was intense. Homework (often hours) every night, and sometimes on the weekend. Tests seemed to happen every week, if not most days. Sena was doing full page writing tasks. Ellie was getting deep into physics (including GSCE Astronomy) to such an extent that she often left any possibility of parental assistance behind. Jessie was super organised and biting off work that would have been unthinkable a year earlier. Sena was transformed – she was not only keeping up with her class, she was moving ahead in certain subjects, in a way that we would have not dared hoped for in Australia. Whatever they put in the water (or the much maligned lunch menu) seemed to be working. 

That said, all three of them were peddling hard, academically and socially, and we certainly had our moments. Social rules here are different – particularly in high school – and Ellie and Jessie still seem to be finding ‘their people’. After a lot of soul searching over summer, Ellie seemed more ‘sure footed’ this year, and has grown up a huge amount (emotionally as well as in actual height!). Jessie continued to amaze us with how well she was adapting to all the changes – of country, of schools, of friendship groups, of moving from being one of the oldest in her class to one of the youngest. We could tell it was a lot, but she was navigating her way through it. And Sena mostly just seemed to surround herself with good people – not to say that there haven’t been some tears and some bumps, but she has still managing to find herself a new best friend and a group of fantastic girls to hang out with. 

The first weekend in December we headed off to Belgium for an experimental weekend. This was our test to see if we could do a Friday night to Sunday night trip to the continent without breaking the kids. A quick, easy 2 hour train to Brussels. Unfortunately the French trade unions had other ideas, and cancelled our Friday night train, leaving us no option but to leave first thing Friday morning. The girls spent Friday exploring the European Parliament, Ant spent it in a cafe on calls. We had an amazing apartment in the spectacular Galleries des Reines – the oldest shopping arcade in the world, and loved wandering around the centre of Brussels.

On the Saturday we took a trip to Liege (for the first time in 25+ years since Anthonys heady days as an exchange student) to visit Josette and Domonic (host parents) – it was so great to be able to spend some time with them for lunch, and just to walk around Liege again was a real thrill.

Later in the afternoon we returned to Brussels and spent the night wandering through the Christmas markets in freezing temperatures, and eating our body weights in frites (at Fritland), gauffres and Belgian chocolate. So good. Izzy, our Christmas Elf, made her first appearance for the year in a Belgian chocolatier’s shop window, much to our general surprise and confusion, and would stay with us for the remainder of the run up to Christmas before disappearing back to wherever she spends her time the other 11 months of the year (we’re told the north pole, but we wouldn’t be surprised to see her skyvving off and sunning herself on some tropical island somewhere when she was meant to be working). 

After a freezing but lovely Sunday morning run, we got to see Lionel (host brother) on Sunday morning whilst the kids went ice skating, before heading to the fascinating Atomium (built for the World Trade Fair in the 1950s) and then making our way back to London. All in all it was a fantastic weekend. Verdict on the ‘Europe for the weekend with 3 kids’ question – it was a ‘yes’ but a cautious one. It was late by the time we got back, the kids were shattered and Monday morning was not easy! 

After our Belgian adventure we were counting down the weeks until the girls finished school (again) and Christmas itself. The last few weeks of school were filled with (more) exams before the school jumped on the Christmas bandwagon. We got into the spirit by buying our Christmas Tree (they are greener and fluffier here, but don’t smell like they should), exploring some of the fun Christmas light expositions around London (the city, Eltham Palace, London Bridge, the west end and lots of heritage buildings all make an effort on this front) and making the most of the Christmas markets that seem to have popped up in lots of different areas around town. 

Suddenly the kids are off school (it’s like they are never there), most of the work Christmas parties are done, and we’re clocking off for Christmas. It’s not quite the same as Australia, where Christmas and the long summer break are rolled into one, but it’s still a definite milestone holiday over here. Projects need to wrap up by the artificial Christmas deadline, and it is the one time of year where everyone puts down their emails for a week. 

For us, Christmas as a 5 day long series of lunches (Liz and I at Brasserie Zédel before a play, seeing Krista and David for a Christmas Eve ‘warm up’) before the obligatory viewing of Elf on Christmas Eve. 

Christmas Day was spent with Jeff, Izabela and the kids down at their house, and then we all went ice skating at Somerset House on the 26th. 

On the 28th, we packed the car for our French roadtrip to the Guillot’s and on to Meribel and headed to the Chunnel. Despite having a few days off in the lead up to Christmas, this felt like the start of our holidays. 

We drove from London down through France to Lyon, stopping there for the night. The drive across France was long, but quite easy and relaxing. We hit up our go to Ibis Budget chain and found a place near Perrache in the centre of Lyon, and hit the town for some famous Lyonaise cuisine. It was the first time we’ve been out in Lyon in a long time and it didn’t disappoint. It really is a stunning city. We had plans to finish the night at the Ayres Rock (still going since 1997) but we ran out of steam after the long drive, and made our way home instead. 

The following morning Ant was out early exploring the city on foot, before we headed over to Fred and Noemie’s for a proper catch up – which was lovely as always. Liz and Ant got lost for seemingly several hours at the hypermarket shopping for our week’s ski trip, and the kids got to reconnect – in particular Ellie and Elfie. 

The following day – not quite as early as we were planning – we piled back in the car for the 2.5 hour trip to Meribel. This didn’t quite go according to plan, and we pulled into the Meribel ski hire place some 7 hours later, having spent most of the day sat stationary on various autoroutes around Haute Savoie. We’ll leave earlier next time! 

We met up with Dave and Lars and made our way to our lovely Aspen Lodge at Meribel Rond Pont – which turned out to be ideally situated above the ski school drop off point and a great apres ski bar.

The next week was spent snowboarding, skiing and hanging out with Dave, Lars and Talia. The boarding was excellent with 4 blue sky powder days giving us ideal conditions for most of the week. All the girls ‘levelled up’ at ESF ski school – Ellie has now ‘graduated’, Jessie is now in Bronze Star and Sena in 2 Star (noting here mainly so we remember for next year!). The girls would ski in the morning whilst Dave and Ant crammed in as much snowboarding as possible around Meribel and Courcheval. Liz would then put on a spectacular lunch, and then we would spend the afternoon skiing together. Ellie is now a better skier than Ant (which is a proud/sad moment) and Jessie is not far behind. Sienna is solid as a rock on most terrain too. Ellie and Jessie also did a couple of afternoons snowboarding – Ellie now comfortably getting down blue runs; Jessie made a strong start (after some early frustration) then hurt her knee on a pommer lift and we spent the afternoon at the medical centre getting x-rays (pleasingly there was nothing broken this time and she was able to ski the following day). 

Whilst we were skiing, Liz and Lars spent a few mornings hiking and snowshoeing around Meribel, or just kicking back in the Village. 


Evenings were spent catching up – with NYE being particularly fun (if somewhat scarring for the kids watching their parents break out into song and dance at regular intervals!).

Before we knew it we were packing up our stuff, saying our goodbyes and getting ready to depart. The snow that had treated us so well during the week required us to use our snow chains to get down the mountain – but YouTube tutorials ensured that this wasn’t a complete disaster. Not wanting to repeat the 7 hour trip up the mountain, we left early on the Saturday morning, wanting to see how far we could get towards Normandy. As we drove out we were already talking about booking our next trip – this time just Ant and the girls for a cheeky weekend in March with Matty. 

Our return trip went like clockwork, and we raced towards Normandy. We had some pretty half baked plans to check out the D-Day landing sights on Sunday morning before our lunchtime Eurostar. This was a great theory, but it turns out that Omaha Beach is 4 hours drive from Calais. We pivoted, and instead headed towards Dunkirk, and started to bore the kids with tales of the war via podcasts. Turns out they really got into it and being on the beach and paying our respects was actually very moving.  

After lovely meal in little brasserie (where Sienna had a disagreement with a snail) followed by a long history of the twerking seat (reference for the girls when they are older) we made our way home.

January was exciting as we had Elfie and Charlie coming to stay on exchange. After much convincing the girls’ school agreed to allow them to attend classes and live with us as if they were one of ours. And they did. At the end of the week the rest of the Guillot family joined in and we explored London and chatted and ate all the sausage that they could carry over.

Ellies 14th birthday came quick… we had booked Harry Potter Studios when we first arrive because it takes 3 years to get tickets. Sadly by the time it came around she was over the whole franchise. Oh well… we had fun!