Friday, May 30, 2008

More news

Already a week gone. We've spent an afternoon at my sister's, getting a bit too much sun and eating and drinking well (two glasses of wine hits hard after 6 months of no alcohol!). We've had some time in town (St Helier) walking along the pedestrian precinct where the majority of the shops are. We bought the kids some underwear at BhS (much better than the stuff we get in Canada). K and S found a couple of Lego sets that they couldn't resist at 101 Toys (all the boys received money from their grandparents). R has met up with some of his old colleagues at Customs. L hasn't been able to hook up his computer to the internet yet....he tried to do it here at my sister's but it didn't work. Last night we had dinner at my in-laws' place and then had a lovely walk around the country lanes.

One forgets how small everything is here. In Canada we're used to four lane highways as standard, big spaces, big vehicles, lots of room. In Jersey, the main roads are two lane, and as soon as you get onto the minor roads they are so narrow that your car is brushing the grass on each side. And then you meet someone coming the other way and have to find a layby to pull into!

The traffic is stop/start and slow - the island speed limit is 40 mph but you rarely get up to that because of the narrowness of the road and the quantity of cars. I read once that Jersey has more cars per person than anywhere else in the world - and I can believe it. One of the tourist leaflets in our flat says that in 2006 there were about 85000 people and 104000 vehicles!!!

Tonight R and I are going out with my sister and her partner for an Indian meal and the kids will be staying at the flat with some DVDs.

It was my nephew's 15th birthday this week and the boys are going to see Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull with him tomorrow. I might even go myself. Then we'll be going out for pizza.

The rest of the week is filling up with more commitments as we try to see everyone before we leave.

4 comments:

Joanne said...

Sounds like a lovely time...must be tough for L not to have his computer!

sheila said...

I'm SO glad you're having a good time. I hope you'll admire the Marmite jars for me!

Nan said...

Sounds like a nice trip, I'm glad you are enjoying yourselves. It is always hard for us to visit EVERY one we want to when we head "home" to New York. Just like you, when I tell someone we are from NY, they assume the city, as when people assume you mean New Jersey! We were a good 400 miles west of the City, and though I lived in NY state for almost 21 years, the first part of my life, I never even got to see the city!

Anonymous said...

Sounds like a busy but blissful vacation. Poor L.