Home to the UK for a visit – just the tonic we needed.

Alison & Ashley gave me the best birthday present ever – return flights from Salalah to the UK, and to top it all they were visiting the UK at the same time with Matthew and Alex, staying with Mum & Dad, so a big family reunion.

The children arranged time off work so we had lots of precious time together, Adam even got up at 4.00am to accompany Katie to the airport to meet us

!

We stayed with Katie and started our visit with afternoon cream teas in the garden, homemade scones, clotted cream and strawberries shared with all the family followed by curry evening at Sheena’s for all 13 of us.

Mum & Dad demonstrated their expert entertaining skills and made good use of their huge dining table as we all descended on them regularly.

A sleepover at Adam & Kirstys’ house by special request from Amalia, who had the whole event planned even down to what Grandma & Grandad Boat would make Amalia and Riley for breakfast !

Adam cooked a wonderful roast beef dinner on Sunday complete with huge yorkshire puddings followed by apple crumble and custard for desert.

And a trip home is never complete without a day out with all the children at Marwell, the Omani camels even came along too !

Dinner with friends was a special treat, especially with Bev and Martin who have been fantastic as surrogate Mum & Dad to our children whilst we have been away.

The girls had all made a special effort to come and see us too – fantastic.  

We had been looking forward to Bev & Martin visiting us on Blue Magic when we arrived in Egypt, before the pirates forced a change of plan.

Mark was so excited to join the Munch Club to watch his team win at St Mary’s, whilst I was excited to join Katie for some retail therapy.

Paul & Jan hosted an amazing Mexican evening for us so that everyone could get together in the evening to swap stories and laugh over old photos.

It was lovely to meet Amalia at her play school, to take the children to the park on their bikes and to walk Tilly by the river. It was great to join Kirsty, Amalia & Riley at the bouncy castle where Grandma and Granddad had to bounce their way through the whole session.

Just as well because Kirsty would have rolled about all over the place with her big round bump !

I visited the hairdresser and we stocked up with spare yacht parts, DVD’s and Marks and Spencer underwear.

We called on friends and crammed the week with all the things we had been missing about the UK.

Thank you to everyone who entertained and pampered us and sorry to those that we didn’t catch up with – next time !

A wonderful spring time week.