More than a week since our last substantial post ! Couple of reasons/excuses. We have been very busy, and I have been sick with a nasty cold.

So to summarize what happened last week;

• Russian and Chinese visas have been sorted and the Mongolian one should be ready tomorrow – so we should get our passports back this week.
• V got a very early birthday present.. and I haven’t seen her since.
• We’ve basically got all the bits and pieces we need – I think the only thing left on the list is a new toothbrush.
• I completed my Open University “Maths for Science” course and assessment. I suspect my first ever “A” for Maths is on it’s way – unbelievable.
• Booked our travel insurance with Travel Nation – V researched options for hours. Let’s hope we don’t need it.
• Made good headway on the IT bits for the trip – finding translation apps for the iPhone and getting our data in order. The iPhone is such an amazing tool for travel. Guide books, talking phrase-books that say “those drugs aren’t mine” in Mandarin, GPS, Blogging, Skype – there is an app for everything. But.. what if it gets stolen ? Then we’ll do it the hard way and make sure everything is backed up to Google docs.

And that’s not all…

The Wheatsheaf Pub

By Friday I was feeling pretty sick with flu but had committed to doing a farewell pub tour around Shifnal with our new house-mate and his friends. I made it as far as two pubs before the beer and flu got the better of me, but V and I had a great time – thanks Steve.

The weekend was spent recovering from beer and flu, working, plotting and packing up odd bits. Managed to get rid of two garbage bags worth of junk. We have booked our train tickets from Stockport to Harwich and our ferry to Esbjerg – our estimated daily budget is already under threat !  Why don’t we just fly to Norway ? because we want to enjoy the ‘travel’ and ease into the trip – besides if we had bought airline tickets we may have hit our heads on this volcano nonsense.

So right now V is looking for train discounts in Denmark, hostels in Hirtshals and trying to get around the Russians ripping us off on a trip to Star City !