Argyll by James

When the conference finished, we decided to head west to Argyll for a few days. We are staying in a small village called Lochgoilhead where at high tide the loch's water laps at our back fence. Today we visited Inverary Castle, the home of the Duke of Argyll. We saw a fake pig on a spit in the kitchen. Tom and I completed the quiz sheet and we both got a pencil for a prize. A man also gave Tom a pound for holding the door open for him (I found another one on our front doorstep). Maybe we should start opening the gate for people at Sacred Heart!  Yesterday we climbed a massive hill (mountains are called 'bens' here and lakes are called 'lochs') and saw some goats. I reached the top first! We had lunch at the pub afterwards. I had fish fingers with chips and baked beans. The lollies here are nicer than the ones we have in Australia.

And, Nanna, this photo is for you!!

London by Tom

Well, we arrived in London safely and on time!! The good news about our flight was that Mum talked our way into the business class lounge in Dubai but the bad news was that James was sick FOUR times on the second flight to London. Luckily the tube from Heathrow smells anyway! We dragged our luggage up lots of stairs to our hotel room (http://www.georgehotel.com/english/index.html), cleaned ourselves up and went to a great playground around the corner called Coram's Fields which is on the site of a Foundling Hospital built in the 1700s to educate children whose mothers were too poor to look after them (http://www.coramsfields.org/). I found some kids to play soccer with (they call it football here and I've also learned to say crisps!) and James especially liked the flying fox.

The next day we went to Hamley's Toyshop (no description necessary), the Charles Dickens Museum (there was a stuffed raven there and lots of old-fashioned clothes as well as books), Coram's Fields (again), the British Museum (the Roman artefacts were my favourite and a lady there let me touch some objects and taught me a Latin word) and... you guessed it... back to Coram's Fields for a quick game of soccer!

That's goodbye from me for now or, as they would have said in Ancient Rome, VALE!

Tom