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Diary of an Australian in Bristol

June 5, 2006

First for Judy's big news - my examiners finally got around to reading my thesis and it has passed! Yay!! I have minor corrections to do, but nothing big... so that's a big relief and cause for much celebration - and I can stop feeling like a fraud working as a post-doc! Have a drink for me and we'll have a drink together next time I see you!

Since we last wrote, we had a lovely break in Ireland for Easter. We decided to stay in one place, to make planning easier and so we could have a relaxing time without trying to run around the whole country at once... so we based ourselves in the town of Ennis and explored County Clare. We had a great time - had a spectacular walk along the Cliffs of Moher as well as some smaller cliffs near Loop Head, climbed a hill in the rather barren region of the Burren, with its limestone covered hills, to see a stone fort (one did question exactly what they were defending - it has to be one of the more desolate places in Ireland, not to mention some of the worst grazing/farming land in the country!) and to enjoy the view, and enjoyed some traditional music and refreshment in the local pubs. All in all, a relaxing and enjoyable long weekend!

The following weekend saw us in London to meet some of the crazy requirements of British bureaucracy - we had to go to Wimbledon during business hours to exchange our Australian driving licences for UK licences! Despite our pilgrimage, they still had to post my passport to Swansea to be checked, because they couldn't possibly check the validity of a UK passport that was issued outside of the UK (no problem with an Australian passport though...). Still, the trip was not entirely painful, since we had tickets to see the Royal Ballet perform "La Fille mal Gardee" at Covent Garden. This fulfilled a long-held dream for one of us... it was a great night! We enjoyed some time sightseeing in London and catching up with Kaylene (ex-flatmate of Stuart), including spending an afternoon lying in the sunshine in Hyde Park - just about the first time the weather has been pleasant enough to just sit around outside for an afternoon...

We also enjoyed a very British experience - celebrations of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Isembard Kingdom Brunel. He is big news in Bristol this year and you can barely go five minutes here without hearing about him! Anyway, celebrations included an outdoor concert, at which we had a lovely picnic (despite the hail, which we found very amusing - a very English experience for our first picnic here!). In fact, we had such an impressive picnic that we (together with friends from Germany and Denmark) got our picture in the local paper - a very non-British contribution to a very British celebration! This was followed by fireworks off the Clifton Suspension Bridge (which was designed by Brunel) - very impressive!







We have had another weekend in Scotland with Phil and Karen - we drove up and met them just north of Loch Lomond. It rained a lot over the weekend, but it was nice to have a chance to relax and spend some time with Phil and Kaz before they head back to Australia. We did manage to get some walking in - we had a nice stroll along a river and through a Caledonian forest one day and then we decided to brave the weather and tackle a munro. After a period of trudging up a steep muddy hill in some nasty rain and wind, the sun came out and we had some great views from the top (followed by more rain...). But it was a lovely walk, all things considered, and great to "bag" one last munro with Phil. Oh, and we stopped in Gretna Green to get married on the way home...

























We also had a nice weekend in Worcester and the Cotswolds - Stuart had a concert with the Bristol Choral Society in Worcester Cathedral. We decided that Worcester is not really a highlight of England - the cathedral is quite spectacular, but that is about all there is to see. We spent Sunday in the Cotswolds (a pretty, hilly bit in the middle of England) looking at steam trains as part of the 100th anniversary of the Great Western Railway Company and at Sudeley Castle (the last home and burial place of Henry VIII's last queen, Catharine Parr), which was quite spectacular and surrounded by lovely gardens. It was mostly a lovely weekend with warm, sunny weather, but there was rain on Sunday afternoon that curtailed our planned walk...























We bought a "vehicle" just before Easter... after setting out with every intention of buying a sensible, small run-about car, we ended up with something a little different - a campervan! We decided that we really only wanted it for going away on weekends (driving and parking around Bristol is crazy and Bristol is small enough that we can easily get most places by walking or cycling), so we hope it will turn out to be a good idea and give us some extra flexibility to get around Britain on weekends. We have now had two nights in the "bus" and it seems to be going well so far...

The weather is gradually improving - or at least it was! We had some nice sunny weather in April and then some quite humid weather with big thunderstorms in early May... but then it went downhill and it was quite cold with a LOT of rain! However, it seems to be looking up again now and we have had several days on sunshine and warmth.

There is an incredible sense here, much more than in Australia, of the world waking up after the winter and spring is a wonderful time of year, with so much colour after the dull winter - in April, we had the blossoms and daffodils... amazing daffodils, hundreds of them, all over the place... then we had tulips everywhere, and the trees are a vibrant green of new leaves and the grass is so green... and suddenly people are out walking and picnicking in the parks (when it's not raining)...

Oh, and work plods along, on the odd occasion that we are there to notice... my experimental work is going slowly with many frustrations with equipment and ambiguous results, but the modelling work is going well and I'm really enjoying it and enjoying working with mysupervisor for that part of the project. Stuart's work is progressing too... the workshop have started prototyping some of his designs and some early tests of the equipment will happen at some stage soon.