Land of Irn Bru

We said goodbye to London and the ppaparazzi surrounding our hotel and headed to Heathrow for the plane up to Edinburgh.
As soon as we hit the BMI lounge my dads eyes kind of glazed over as he went searching through there various fridges for something. After 5 minutes he came back triumphantly with a bright orange can of irn bru in his hand preceded to open it and down it almost in one. He went on to explain that this stuff outsells coke and pepsi in Scotland. He got  quite passionate about it. I thought he was going to paint his face and start shouting about not taking away his freedom. Not sure how that would have went over in the lounge.

We got to Edinburgh and went to Grannys house and almost got eaten by the dog. Here is a picture of me at the street my dad grew up in,

The dog is called Fergus. He is quite young a boisterous and can pull Grannys arms off. He is crazy. There is also a cat in the house. I think the cat was Auntie Fees but has been left behind for Granny to look after. All the cat does is sleep, eat, fight Fergus and make dad sneeze.

We went to the city and met Auntie Fee after her work. You should see the castle they have in this town. Amazing.

Tomorrow it is seeing my big brother Rudi. I am looking forward to that.

Will

France is on Strike

We went to Paris. The place was on Strike. The weather cold and wet and the Louvre was shut!

We hit the Eurostar from London to Paris. We were excited. We had two main missions for the day.

1) Get a photo of the me next to the Mona Lisa for Charlotte. **

2) Go up the Eiffel Tower

** There is a super Italian restaurant in Albert Park called Ricardos. Above the fireplace there they have a picture of the Mona Lisa and little Lottie loves it.

So we arrive at the Gard Du Nord after an easy journey through the Channel Tunnel. Now taxi queues at this station are already renowned to be bad but with the strike and the blocking of the petrol stations there was about 200 people queuing in the rain. ouch! Dad was not impressed and he whipped me to the other side of the station and harassed a taxi driver dropping a customer to take us. I think his complete command of the French language helped. Well when I say complete command he was able to tell the taxi driver his name, his age and appeared to be ordering a beer! Still next stop the Louvre.

The Louvre was shut. Here is what I thought of that....(see photo)

So what should we do...taxis were hard to find. We could have hit the Metro but there was even talks of that being disrupted.

Alas a guaranteed way to travel the city and bring us to where we wanted to go. We jumped on a Tour Bus. It was heading to Notre Dame and then up the Champs Elysses. Dad had told me we had some very important business to take care of on the Champs Elysees.

He said we had to eat a Jambon et Fromage Baguette.

Dad explained that when I was in mummy's Tummy they went to Paris for a weekend before moving to Montreal. One of their favourite memories was walking down this fabulous Boulevard and chomping on these great sandwiches.

So that is what we did. Cheers to you Mum.

Shortly after that we headed to to the Eiffel Tower. You can see in the photo I am wearing it as a hat!

So we queued for the tickets. Queued for security, Queued for the lift to the first level. Queued for the lift for the second level and finally we made it to the top of this quite marvelous structure.

The views from up high were amazing. I have to admit that I was a bit frightened going up to the top. Dad reminded me that this is why we came and I got some courage up and made it all the way.

Here is a photo from the top. I bought a small souvenir tower from the shop and then we hit the road back to the train station to catch an early train back to London.

We completed half of the mission. We did buy a postcard for Charlotte though that had the Mona Lisa on it. Dad was grumbling about the strikes and suggested that if the workers were made to work the days they had off on strikes they would quite easily extend the extra 2 years the govt want them to work until retirement! Whatever that means.!

Anyway back to our hotel. A big bath and room service beckons.

Will

PS Room service is brilliant. Here is me eating my macaroni cheese with poached salmon in my jammies.

LEGOLAND

I like Lego. Dad always encouraged me to play with it when I was younger - although buying me a 10000 piece star wars death star was more likely to put me off than encourage me. Anyway as soon as I turned 6 and a half all I wanted to do was build Lego. I would build it before school, after school, before the bath, at weekends and any other spare minute I had. I like all the sets, Star Wars, Harry Potter, City, Prince of Persia etc so a chance to go to Legoland was very very exciting.

Lego land is in a place called Windsor. Windsor is more famous for its castle. Windsor Castle is the oldest and largest occupied castle in the world and the Official Residence of Her Majesty The Queen. Today however we were after modern history and we bypassed the castle and went straight to Legoland.

The place is split into a number of sections.

Miniland - this has small replicas of famous buildings in Europe. I liked the Edinburgh Castle and was not sure why Belgium made it in.

Pirates - This had a wicked play park.

Knights - Rollercoaster crazy. See picture below,

Adventureland - Had a wicked water ride and daddy and I went on it loads of times and got soaken wet.

It was a real fun day out. There are few pictures below.  See ya. Will

I kissed a girl....

There were a lot of strange goings on in our hotel. When we were on the Big Red Bus we passed it and there were police blocking off the road and lots of security, flashing blue lights and police escort motorbikes.

Then when we got back, there were about 30 photographers outside. We spilled out of our taxi and asked the doorman what on earth was going on. Turns out Dad was not the only 'famous' person at the hotel. We had the President of Chile and Katie Perry and her boyfriend Russell Bland staying also although not all in the same room I am sure.

Now that explained all the kerfuffle. I wanted to meet Katie Perry. I was even going to tell her that I too was a Canadian in the hope I would get a kiss and that she would like it. Alas it was not to be. She was hiding out before she headed to India to get married.

We did see the Prez of Chile though. Dad said his football team were exciting at the world cup and that he was trying to be a bit like Margaret Thatcher and get his workers out the mines. He was a nice man. We saw him at breakfast and later that day he was on TV as he met the Queen. How cool was that? When we saw him he smiled nicely so we think Chile is a good place to go to and will put it on our list next time.

Will

Land of the Dinosaurs

First stop on our Tour where we got off was the Natural History Museum. Now the building itself should be in a museum as it is absolutely fabulous (apart from the 70's extension that some madman put on it).

They have the best dinosaurs exhibit ever. We got there just after opening but it was already packed and everyone wanted to go to see the Tyrannosaurus Rex that was growling. It was excellent. They also have this huge Blue Whale model. Amazing to see how big they are against a lot of animals I thought were big like Rhino and Elephants. After the museum we jumped on the bus and hit the main sights of London.

artistic picture by Dad

Houses of Parliament - CHECK (Named after Daddys favourite Sauce)

Tower Bridge  CHECK (the one the Americans thought they bought)

Tower of London CHECK (more jewels than mummy here)

Trafalgar Square CHECK (The lions look like dogs with wigs on)

Buckingham Palace CHECK (Her Majesty was home and meeting our breakfast buddy - more on this later)

The city of London has such amazing history and you could explore it for weeks. We took the big red bus shortcut and did it in a couple of hours and hit the hotel for a rest......Will

This is England

Flight from Johannesburg to London was uneventful. Mind you we were not impressed. The inflight magazine said Toy Story 3 was to be shown. The screens however painted or in this case showed a different picture. Dad pointed out this error to the Steward who said nobody had complained before! Dad explained that nobody had got on the plane with a 4ft tall Woody from the movie with them before! Still after that disappointment I settled down for a snooze and woke as we arrived into London.

One of our challenges on arrival was what passport queue to get into. Dad has a British one and I have a Canadian or a NZ one. If we went through the UK Nationals Line will they get upset with my passport? Or should we join the "Visitors" line even though Dad has a UK one. We were debating it for a while as we walked the 40KM from our arrival gate towards immigration, when a lady arrived carrying a sign that said "Irving". Excellent. She then managed to guide us past all the long queues and right to the front of immigration. Bingo. Dilemma gone. Turns out the hotel sent her to get us to our driver as dad cannot be trusted I think.

Whilst we waited on our bags she was delighted to find out that I had a NZ passport and explained that she was going to go to NZ on holiday next year and wanted ideas. Dad being the expert on NZ (loud coughing noises) talked about all the places to visit that have poo or kak in the name. Anyway we grabbed our bags and met our driver. As we were about to leave the lady asked for an email address so our mum could fix all dads bad advice, so dad scribbled something on a bit of paper. The driver thought he was giving her his autograph and all the way to the hotel the driver was asking dad if he was someone famous. Dad was in denial of course but I told the driver he was very famous in our house.

We checked into the hotel but alas there was no room ready - ouch. However they found us a small day room for us to go and chill out. We showered changed and headed to the only place a young boy should go to. Hamleys Toy Store. The biggest in the world. Yippee.

aokhjh**664B %#$u&*& jyjgthfgdev&%^$%cbv464UY9 ^^*y

OOOPS sorry that was me just emulating the meltdown I had after finding they had no Harry Potter toys. Disaster. Still we did some xmas shopping for Charlotte and then headed to the big red bus to give us a tour.

Will

Good Bye Safari - Hello Old Blighty

Well the Safari came to an end. We were sad to go as it was an Awesome place.

The staff at ULUSABA were fantastic and very very nice. The chef even made me a special pizza. (Oh! and mum just in case you thought it was all pizza a beer with daddy here is a photo to prove that I at least picked up a piece of fruit!)

So we left on Friday and went in the small plane again and headed to Johannesburg airport.

The ride back to Johannesburg was very very bumpy. There were lots of clouds and thunderstorms in the area. The plane had to weave its way through the clouds and the storms.A lady on our flight was very frightened. I told her it would be okay and that I was not scared so she should be okay. I am sure she appreciated it but was a bit green at the moment.

Here is a picture of the clouds that we came across on the plane.

When we landed in Joburg we were met at the airport by Dads friend Trevor. We decided to take the new train from the airport to Sandton where we were staying. Dad explained that there used to be lots of trouble in Johannesburg, (especially when he lived there) and a lot of businesses had moved from the CBD to this place called Sandton. The Train was good and very safe. We checked into our Hotel and then went out to dinner with a whole bunch of Dads friends. I was very tired and after a while I almost fell asleep at the table so Dad carried me home early and I went to bed after a long day.

On Saturday we went shopping. I got some soft cuddly toys for my wee sister. I kept trying to drag dad into the diamond stores but he kept mumbling and going cross eyed so I guess mum has to wait another while!

That night we headed back to the airport, probably ate fruit at the airport and headed off to London.

Will

Toy Story 4 - On Safari

Dear Charlotte (my sister),

I wanted to let you know that we had some unusual sightings during the Safari. Dad managed to capture a few of them on Camera. I think Jessie was scouting for venues for a new movie.

Anyway every day daddy and I talk about you Charlotte and how we think you are crazy and how much we love you. We miss you. Hope you enjoyed seeing Jessie.

Will

Blink and you may miss the Cheetah!

• Dad can run at about 15 miles per hour. (he says he used to be faster!)
• Top Sprinters can run at 25 miles per hour.
• A greyhound dog can run at 40 miles per hour
• A horse can run at 50 miles an hour (not the ones dad supports in the Melbourne Cup though)
• The fastest animal on legs is the Cheetah and he can run at 70 Miles per hour. (112 KPH)

In Melbourne that is enough to be classified as a Hoon. Maybe they would confiscate his spots or something.
Anyway we were very very lucky to spot one. Here are some pics.

We also got a short video of this cat walking. He was very lean and you can just imagine how quick he can go after his prey.

Q. Why do Rhinos have Horns?

A. To tell other Animals to get out the way.

Unfortunately it is its horn that gets the Rhino into trouble. That and its poor eyesight means it can't see the poachers. The rhinoceros have been brought to the edge of extinction because of people killing them for their Horns. This year in South Africa alone nearly 300 Rhino have been killed for their horns.

The horns have been prized for tens of centuries for their beautiful translucent color when carved, and their supposed healing properties.The fact is the horn is made of the same stuff as our fingernails. People are mad killing these animals it is quite sad. They should chew their own fingernails instead.

The bush we went to has 24 hour security tracking poachers. Here are some photos we took during the Safari.

see you
Will

Dad in the Pool

Here is a picture of Dad in the pool. (only joking) It is amazing that these animals that can weigh up to to 2.5 tonnes are not part of the Big 5.
They stay in the water during the day to protect their skin from the sun (must have originated from Scotland)
They get out of the pool now and then have a fight and then go and spend the evening eating. (West Coast Scotland must be the origin only the liking to Water causes it to be questioned).

see you
Will

The Leopard came for Tea

On one of our night Safari expeditions we came across a Leopord sitting at a tree. Now this leopard had a big dinner in front of him. It seemed as though he went through the drive through and ordered a large Impala with a small Kudu on the side.

We shot this video of him having his dinner.

The leopords seem to be very active. They kill their prey and drag them up trees to eat them in relative peace. Probably because the lions will come along and try and pinch it.

The leopord was my favorite animal on this trip. They are really cool. Dad has some great photos and we will post them soon.

Will

The Big 5

The Big 5 is an expression that is used to describe 5 animals that if you are lucky you may see in Safari. Our guide said the term comes from the days of Hunters. Thankfully there were no hunters where we were.

The Big 5 are:

• LION
• ELEPHANT
• WATER BUFFALO
• LEOPARD
• RHINOCEROS

No picture of me at a Water Buffalo but let me tell you something. My guide said he would prefer to walk round a corner and face a lion or a leopard than one of these things. They are like cows with really really bad attitude.

More pics coming soon.

Will

My First Safari

Thought I would start off with some pictures this time as we headed out on our Safari. We are doing two Safaris a day. One at 5.30am and the other at 4.30pm. Yes you read that correctly 5.30am. Ouch. We go on Land Rovers (picture above). Like Mummys Car but without the roof, the seatbelts and unfortunately the seat back DVD player.

The temperature can get a bit chilly so dad has a back that has extra sweatshirts, wooly hats, scarfes and gloves. We have the camera and choose the middle seats in the car. Our guide Johan is ready and off we go. This is exciting. We head down the steep slope from the lodge and hit the bush tracks searching for big game. We have a tracker on our car also. He sits on the seat that is on the bonnet (see pic). He looks for tracks in the ground. They also have a big gun on the car. I don't want to touch that. Johan says it is for safety and only he gets to hold it.

Within 5 minutes of departing we see our tracker whirl his hanbd above his head and shout out instructions. Soon we turn into the bush and go off road and hear rustling noises in the bush up ahead. Then we see my Daddys favorite animal - Elephants. They came right up to the side of the car. It was amazing. They are massive. The ranger told us all about them. He said there is a mummy elephant that rules the whole group and that the males are often sent off from the group. It takes 22 months for a mummy elephant to have a baby. And another amazing thing is the ears of an African elephant are the same shape as the continent of Africa.

Daddy asked why the Indian elephant had smaller ears. The tracker thinks that the jungle in India is far more dense and bigger ears would get snagged, whereas in Africa the bush is less dense.

Elephants spend about 22 hours a day eating and their digestive system is so poor they only digest 45% of what they eat. No wonder there is so much elephant poo everywhere.

It was very exciting to see them.

To be continued

Goodbye Sun City, Hello Safari

Well it was another early start. Up for breakfast and then in a car for a two hour trip to Johannesburg Airport.We were flying from Johannesburg on a small airline to Kruger National park. It was funny as we found the airline desk in the Bus Terminal. Maybe we were getting a bus with wings. Scary.

Here is a picture of me getting on the plane. It was a little bit small and had one seat on either side of the isle. However it was bigger and better than the one I took to Dunk Island last year. I looked out of the window and thought I saw them puting in the mail bags also.

The pilots were cool and came up and talked to me. I think I calmed them down and also Dad as he needed his hand held on takeoff. We were on a puddle jumper or whatever that means as the ground was dry and there was not too many puddles but we landed and let a few other people of the plane then we took off again.

After an hour in the air we arrived at Ulusaba. This is the name of the Safari lodge daddy and I are staying in. The people who met us at the landing strip took all our bags and offered up champagne.(Daddys only it seems) Good times. We then jumped into a jeep and guess what there was no seat belts.

The lodge itself is perched high on a small mountain. The road up to it is scary. I think if we lived here mums car would make it up but dad would have to leave his scooter at the bottom and walk. It was very steep.

We were met by the lodge staff and they showed us around. The place is awesome it has a pool and a huge dining area with windows that allow you to look out for miles and miles. There is some big mounted binoculars and you can search out animals coming to the watering hole below. I saw a Giraffe there.
There is also a big bar. The man showing us around said this place is our home and daddy could go behind the bar and help himself. I hope the beer is cold enough for him.

We then got shown to our room. We had something called the master suite. There is a picture here. Check out the bed. It has tree trunks at the end of it and a huge mosquito net. PS. MUM, Daddy and I have taklen our Malaria pills every single day so far. Although I have to remind him! I am really looking forward to the Safari this afternoon.

See you all.

Will

Who is The Tube?

Sun city also had a Water Park with big water slides. Dad and I decided to check it out.



Picking the right Tube is a science



First of all you had to grab a tube. Then you had to walk up about 100 steps through jungle and rocks.

At the very top there were two slides. An open one and a closed one. (The closed one is like a tunnel where it is pitch black and you cannot see the twists and turns ahead of you).

We started on the open one. It was fantastic. Daddy came out backwards at the bottom. I wanted to do it again and again and again. And I did.

 

I eventually plucked up enough courage to go down the tunnel one. It was called Viper as I think it snaked down the hill. It was so cool. I loved it. You could not see where you were going and I ended up going backwards down this dark tunnel. It was such a laugh. I did that one again and again also.

Anyway after 6 hours in the water it was time to call it a day. We headed back to the hotel. Dad had bumped into an old friend at breakfast time and we had made dinner plans.

Phew! I made it down.



What a day. I was really tired by the end of it. We are off to Ulusaba Game Reserve in the morning via planes, trains and automobile.

Will

PS for you apple fans out there get Cut the Rope game app as it really helps pass the time on journeys.

Making Waves

Daddy told me this place has a Wave Pool and a beach even though it is very far away from the sea. So our plan was breakfast and then change into our swimming costumes and cool sunglasses and head there first thing.

The weather was to be really sunny and 30 degrees

As we walked to the 'beach' we came across a big waterfall it was really cool. There is a picture of it here in the background.

We walked down lots of stairs and came across the pool area. It was absolutely huge and it did  have a beach. It was fantastic. We found a shaded spot grabbed a few towels and hit the water.

There was a lot of waves and we went into water and floated around in the gentle waves it was fun. I was able to show dad how to do a rolly polly in the water.

About 10 minutes later a siren sounded and we saw a number of people leave the pool. We wandered what was happening. At the end of this massive pool there were six lions heads in stone on the wall. Slowly each of them started spouting water out btheir mouth. When the sixth one started there was a noise like thunder and the biggest wave I have ever seen came crashing towards us.

Dad grabbed me but as it hit us we were pushed and pulled and ended up falling on our bottoms. It was amazing and so much fun. We had worked out how it was working as the wave would come after the lions started spouting water so we watched for the small waterfalls then dad would lift me high in the air to beat the wave. It was awesome. Below is some pictures of me in the waves and the beach.

 

Sun City Arrival - Cheeky Monkeys

When we arrives at Sun City is was dark. I could not see that much. The place is called the Palace of the Lost City, and as it took 2 hours to get to I did feel quite lost. Just as well I slept most of the way there.

 As we waited for check in one of the mangers came down and spoke to Daddy. One of the things he said was make sure you lock your room as today we got hit pretty bad by the Baboons today. He explained that a number of guests thought they had been robbed but what happens is the monkeys open the sliding doors on the balcony and get into your room then look for food which often means throwing all your belongings out your suitcase.

When I got to the room I made sure all the doors were shut. Dad was laughing at me but guess what. When we were coming back from the pool we saw 3 monkeys climing on the hotel balconies. It was soooo cool.

Here is a picture of the hotel. It really is like a Palace.

bye
Will

On the Plane to South Africa

The plane journey is llllllllllllllllllooooooooooooooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnngggggggg.
Not helped by the lack of Toy Story 3 on the entertainment system.
I did not get much sleep for the first 10 hours and managed to fall asleep with an hour to go.
After we landed we jumped in a mini bus and headed north to Sun City. I fell asleep again on the trip up.
We checked into the hotel and went for pizza. I need to start the Malaria tablets today. Yuck. Off to more sleep now.
Will

At the Airport Day 1

I was woken up at 4.30 am. That is in the middle of the night. Not even my sister wakes me up at that time. It was daddy saying time to get up and go. Ouch! I quickly got dressed and went downstairs to drag the luggage out to the taxi. Look at how many bags I had to deal with.

We got to the airport in good time and boarded our flight from Melbourne to Perth.

I was a bit sad leaving mummy and Charlotte behind but excited to be going on an adventure.

See you Will

Getting Ready

Today was a busy day. I went to Gym in the morning and Daddy took Charlotte (my little sister) into the city. After Gym mummy and I went to see the Mary Poppins show at the theatre. It was excellent.

Mummy had laid out a lot of clothes for packing into my suitcase and spent a lot of time telling daddy about medicines!

So this is my last sleep before we head to our journey. The taxi is picking us up at 5.00am. We are doing the following Trip.

Melbourne to Perth

Perth to South Africa

South Africa to London, UK

London to Edinburgh, Scotland

Scotland to NY

NY to Melbourne

It should be a lot of fun. I am looking forward to the safari. Now I need to get some sleep (if i can as I am pretty excited). Will post to this blog when I can.

William