Great Western Coffee Shop

Tomorrow, Lisa and I leave "Aurora" and jump back into life ashore.  We have turned our lives upside down for September for the "holiday of a lifetime" - more than twice the length of any break we have taken before, and very much being in each other's pockets – swapping a house where we each have very much our own space, and an environment where we can get out when and where we please for a ship where for most of the time we can be no more that 150 metres from our base.  For the absence of doubt, it has worked well - and I can't imagine that it would have worked well with anyone else!

Thank you, dear readers, for following some (or even all) of these travel messages - I hope you have enjoyed them. With a personal interest in travel and transport, I have attempted to maintain some relevance to members here who also have an interest in such topics; there have been some interesting comparisons, and also some experiences so far from Wiltshire that they're incomparable.   And we have learned things too - from a different perspective and of goodness-knows what use in the future.  We come back with a knowledge of Bridge, which is totally irrelevant to a transport forum (though I have read of bridge clubs run on and by Brighton Belle commuters).  And we come back with an insight from an interesting series of lectures on fake news, press freedom, and what can and can't be published and the laws effecting what can be published and what and how an author's, publishers or moderator's are.  Largely confirmatory, but useful for the future.

I look forward to a busy October – to seeing a number of you in person and many online during the month; a "thank you" to the moderator team for keeping the form ship-shape for this last month, even though Lisa and I have been the ones on the ship!  And an especial "thank you" to BigNoseMac who has been looking after Billy and our Melksham base - which chose to throw all the curved balls it could at him.  I hope the setup has proven to very much a positive one for all parties; indications are that such is the case.

In 25 minutes, the ship's clocks jump forward and we'll be back on British "Summer" time.  Over and out from our holiday timezones.

The curve balls were largely manageable in the grand scheme of things. Everyone's home has it's foibles. Chez grahame just decided that September was the month to manifest the odd issue. ;)

21st century communication technology (whilst occasionally patchy) certainly helped straighten those curve balls.

Its been a pleasure looking after Billy. He and Finn are now firm friends and I'm sure Finn will miss the space and gardens when he returns to our flat.

Right. Time to get on and clear up all evidence of the wild parties.


 :P ;) ;D

Thank you Graham, I've really enjoyed your blogging; totally fascinating.
Hopefully you have realised your travelled on a SHIP by now.........   >:( >:(

Welcome soon, back to dear old Blighty. I've had a good trip through your travelogue. Where next? The Severn Beach and Avonmouth experience on the Severn Riviera Express?

Home for the moment.   Pictures from today, below ... no more travel until Thursday ...

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/homeagain01.jpg)

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/homeagain02.jpg)

You know it's been "black dog day", right?   Promoting the love and adoption of black dogs.

Welcome back. Your transatlantic musings have been most enjoyable.

Never been to America or Canada, wasnt sure they in fact were real, still not sure about the USA.

Many years ago my brother tried to convince an American customer in the bar where he worked that Scotland did not exist and was just a fantasy marketing construct created by the UK tourist authorities. He based his case on the improbability of a country existing with monster filled lakes where men in skirts ran around tossing tree trunks shouting "hoots".
I can't remember how that went down, must ask him some time.