Returning from Aberdeen to Oslo

This morning I had to get up early and finish the last bit of the packing before I would have to leave. Every ounce of the suitcases were very carefully packed and weighed and when I was ready I woke Anni up so that we could have breakfast together before I had to leave.

I stopped by the Laura Ashley store at the Bon Accord Shopping Center, but this time only to get help with all the recipts and the tax free shopping forms so that I could send that before leaving Scotland. As it turned out I had gotten the wrong form yesterday and hence I got the new form today and they helped me completed it before I had to leave.

As soon as I was done at the Laura Ashley store I went to the bus stop for the airport bus and i was taken to the Aberdeen airport.

My flights back home were quite uneventful, however when I got back I was greeted by the catsitter who had prepared me a lovely meal and a very happy cat that was happy mommy was home. The catsitter left after dinner and I enjoyed a quiet evening at home with kitty.

Aberdeen Beach & Shopping

Anni and I woke up a bit late and enjoyed a relaxing morning. The weather was rather good and we decided to take a walk along the city beach and then go for breakfast at the beach.

We got dressed and set off into the nice day through Aberdeen towards the shore and the beaches. We passed the Amusement park and headed down to walk on the beach. The waves had made beautiful patterns in the sand there was the cutest dog, running up and down to avoid the water, but still playing with it.

The Aberdeen Beach Promenade

A Paddle Surfer. Awesome techniques.

After our stroll on the beach we stopped at the Sand Dollar Cafe where we had pancakes and bacon for lunch. It was so good.

Me and Anni at the Sand Dollar Cafe for lunch.

After lunch we walked in to the city centre where we walked around for a little just enjoying the day.

The Merekat Cross

After we were done with the sightseeing and it was time to move towards home, we stopped by Bon Accord Shopping center again where we were only supposed to check out something, but ended up staying another hour at Laura Ashley.

Today I got a few more items, and by now my pile of new clothes has gotten this high:

I also got a tax free form to complete for all the shopping I had done to see if I could get some money back on the taxes.

For dinner we went up to a nearby Indian restaurant  and brought with us some food so that we wouldnt have to make dinner :D We shared a bottle of red wine and had a very nice evening.

Saturday retail Therapy @ Laura Ashley & Aberdeen Sightseeing

Anni and I had a nice breakfast together this morning, before we strolled off towards the city center where the train station was our first stop for Anni to pick up train tickets she had ordered.

After picking up the tickets we walked around in the streets of Aberdeen for a while.

I was very fascinated by this moss covered churchyard in the middle of Aberdeen centre.

We also went through the Union Terrace Gardens which was beautiful.

After the sightseeing round we stopped at the Bon Accord shopping center… and there we went wild at the Laura Ashley store…

I might have gone a bit bad yesterday and today, but… It felt so good.
There is no therapy like Retail Therapy.

For dinner Anni cooked a delicious Chili con Carne which we enjoyed with her friend Ani that came over for a lovely evening!

Shopping in Aberdeen

Anni and I shared a lovely breakfast together before I set off for sightseeing and Anni went to work. I spent almost all day walking. I walked up and down streets, shopping centers, tourist attractions and in and out of stores. I had a great day and where in Norway no stores what so ever are open over the official holidays of easter, every store in Aberdeen was and  I had a great time shopping and enjoying my day outside. I bought a lovely top at Debenhams, DVDs at HMV and then we had Laura Ashley, where I stopped for several hours and came out with lots of nice clothes :D

It was raining a bit and I went to have a coffee

At 6 PM I met Anni at Kings College where she has her office and does her studies. We went out for a few drinks and some food at the St Machar bar at the university area where we met up with a few of her friends as well.

The famous Kings College of Aberdeen.

Well at home we shared a bottle of bubbly and sparkly and had a very nice time chatting and enjoying to catch up before going to bed.

Aberdeen – Here I come!

It has been just 3 days less than 5 weeks since I got home from Costa Rica and I’m already on the wings again !

This time the destination is Aberdeen and I’m visiting a friend of mine there.

I left Oslo around midday and flew through Copenhagen and then to Aberdeen. I had a quite nice trip and I flew in one of the smallest planes I have been in ever.

Landing in Aberdeen I took the airport shuttle into the city and Broad Street where my friend and host Anni was waiting for me.

We walked home to Annis place, left my luggage at her place, had  a few glasses of lovely red wine and went groceries shopping. Then we went back to Annis place and made lovely dinner and chatted the night away. :D

Aberdeen on the web
On Wikipedia
Aberdeen Tourism

Ditton Park

This week I have spent in Ditton Park, UK which is the main office for CA in Europe, attending a course in Server Automation.

The river

Ditton Park (to be referred to as DP) in itself is a HUGE park with lovely green areas and surrounded by forest in the Datchet / Windsor / Slough area of Berkshire, England.

The main office is by the entrance, however we were located in the Manor house where our course was held. We had to cross this lovely little river to get there.

Beautiful Surroundings truly does inspire. Even if there is lots of noise from the planes taking off and landing at Heathrow airport, DP is a peaceful place with a tiny river running through the area, ducks swimming in the river, geese eating grass and even a few herons here and there and I walked to and from work through this lovely area to my hotel every day.

Beautiful Reflections

A few mornings I went on photoshoots as well to try to capture nice images of the duck and geese families with their young as well as the beautiful surroundings around DP area.

Come here now – All of you… Where is your brother?

and

See ya’all – This is how you drink

The course itself was challenging and very interesting. I learned a lot and we finalized the week with an exam that I passed ! YAY. I am actually inmensely proud of this due to the level of difficult that it was. People attending the copurse were mainly from my own VSA Services PUMA group, but we also had a VSA PreSales guy attending from Austria. This was great – because that way I could get to know more of the people I work with.

Monday night I had dinner with my boss, Roy, and a colleague, Paul, at one of the Hotel Restaurants. Lovely dinner. Tuesday I went to Slough for shopping. Wednesday 2 of my colleagues and I went to Windsor to see the Queen. Thursday I spent relaxing in the Hotel.

All in all it was a great week and Im happy with all the  material I learned and not to mention the exam that I passed. After the Exam on Friday I had to return to the hotel and check out. Then i went for lunch and then It was soon time to go to the airport. Returning home for this time. It was a great week !

Walking and Dining amongst Royals

Today after work two of my colleagues and I spent the evening in Royal surroundings in Windsor / Eton.

We started out leaving the Hotel at 7pm and Paul drove us to Windsor, where we found ourselves driving around to figure out where to park. Windsor was packed with people! There were people EVERYWHERE! We soon realized that the Royal Windsor Horse Show and the Windsor Royal Castle Tattoo is going on for these days.

We soon found a parking spot and strolled down alongside the River Thames, before we crossed the bride over to Eton, where the Royals are schooled.

ETON

After seeing the school, we went back to Windsor again and we headed up towards the Windsor Royal Shopping Center (which is about where I had dinner with my colleagues last time I was in UK for the team meeting), following the Royal Castle. The guys were asked to help an old lady (probably not the queen in disguise) carry her shopping bags, which they gladly helped her with and I went around playing with my camera trying to capture some good images of the Castle.

The Royal Castle

The Crooked House of Windsor, also known as the Market Cross House, was built in 1592.

We walked in some tiny streets with lots of restaurants and of course we found The Crooked House of Windsor. The Crooked House of Windsor is a tiny house that is completely crooked.

The house was built in 1592 and it has a secret passageway directly to the Windsor Castle that back then was used for deliveries of groceries from the market and some even say it was used by King Charles and his mistress to meet.

The house didn’t start to tilt until 1718 after it was restructured with unseasoned green oak. The building now functions as a tea house for patrons who don’t mind sitting at a bit of an angle; the crooked floors were never leveled.

This passageway is, for understandable reasons, now sealed off :D

As we walked around the Castle, we noticed that the Royal Standards flag was hanging high from the flag poles at Her Majesty the Queens castle – meaning she was actually at home …

Wooohooo. We are now officially in company of Royals! It is a common fact that Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth likes to attend the Royal Windsor Horse Show each year- which practically is being organized right outside her doorsteps.

We continued on and we decided it was about time to get something to eat. We walked down towards the lower parts of Windsor and found a lovely bar called The Royal Oak where we decided to have a stop. The food there was nothing else than lovely. It was so good.

The Royal Oak Pub

I had a Lamb Shank served on mashed potatoes and fresh vegetables with a rosemary and red wine sauce. It must be the best meal I had in UK – if not all times – definately for this trip ! For dessert I had a Chocolate Sponge cake – which was absolutely mouthwatering delcious …
I also got a taste of the Treacle Sponge cake the guys had (which I was very much tempted to have ordered instead of the chocolate… it was so good – I have to make that pudding at home one day.

We went home after dinner and it was already so late it was time to go to sleep.
It was a lovely day in great company.

Shopping in Slough

After work today I took the complimentary shuttle down to Slough. I was heading for a little adventure of my own. NOT that I would state that Slough is the most interesting place in the world, but at least it has a little centre and some stores and even a mall, compared to the area around the hotel. The sad thing however, is that almost all the stores close at 6pm. This didn’t give me a lot of time.

I was in no rush though – I had no plans, but I just wanted to actually peek around and not just sit in the hotel room twirling thumbs (not that I would ever do that anywhere I would go or if I stayed home). I explored the Mall first, considering its short opening hours, then I moved on to walking around and getting to know the city itself. Slough is a workers town and most stores close early because the employees have to commute to other places. I found a few nice items at Debenhams and I had a good time looking around.

I ended my little trip at a huge 24 hour open Tesco (which is a multi store with everything you need from food to clothes to books and office equipment, gardening stuff and magazines and bakery and well, mainly anything) where I looke around. I got some food for myself – its not that the hotel food or the cafeteria food at work isnt good enough – I just think its really nice to try out new food – like the mango/passion/papaya yoghurt – I think Ill have that for breakfast tomorrow morning. I also found a few things Ill be brining home as gifts for my little sisters :D

I took the 81 bus back, which left me directly outside of my hotel :D

I had a couple of nice sandwiches and some lovely fruit in the hotel room where I spent the rest of the night.

A lovely day :D

1 is good – 2 is great company – 3 is a party

I woke up to a smiling and fresh Margaret sticking her head into the living room to wake me up. We had a delicious breakfast and then I had to get ready and work my way to Central London.

Due to the District line, the Hammersmith & City and the Circle line being closed for the weekend for construction and upgrade work, I had to change transportation several times to get downtown whereas on a normal day I should have not needed to change at all.

This, of course, helped me arrive late to my appointment with Anni. However… This neither ruined mine nor Annis mood ! Once we first met up at Henrys Cafe and Bar (just next to Green Park Sub Station) we had a fantastic time ! She was deep into her prosecco and I joined her with some lovely Pinot Grigio wine. We spent a great time updating eachother since our last meeting and having a lovely lunch. Once lunch was over we realized it was time to order more drinks. We discussed whether to have a whole bottle of Prosecco and as we ordered we looked at the time to find out when we would be expecting Chris to join us. Just as we checked the time, Chris actually turned up. YAY

The Prosecco was a fact by then and we had a great time catching up, taking pictures and enjoying a really great afternoon until we realized that the guys on the table next to us had left with their glasses mainly half full…
This was a topic until Chris had something he wanted to check in his bag and we very soon realized the guys had taken off with his bag. This Cooled down our moods quite a bit, but as Chris notified the Bar crew they told us they had a surveilance camera and as they checked this camera they had the whole act on film. This at least is very helpful for the Police to recognize the thiefs so that they can catch the guys.

Apart from this we had a lovely day together, but as we all know – all parties has to end and we all had to split up and  go home.

Home for me is at the Heathrow / Windsor Marriott Hotel. To get there I took the Picadilly line to Heathrow Airport and from there I grabbed a Cab. I checked in and it was such a nice place. I had a nice evening and I had dinner in the Hotel ;D

Conquering East and Central London

Margarets smiley face popped into the livingroom door to check if I was awake and let me know that she was preparing for breakfast in the kitchen. We had a really nice breakfast (Margaret is really good company) and we talked and talked. If I hadnt planned to go downtown for shopping and Margaret had to study I am quite certain we would continued talking the whole day.

I had a shower before I set off. When I got to East Ham I realized that the sub lines was down due to construction plans and … I had to take a bus to Leyton where I planned on getting the metro downtown to Oxford Circus, but before I got that far I saw that there was a huge TK Maxx store at Leyton where I spent a nice time. I didnt really come out with too mkuch stuff. 2 jackets and a scarf was the big catch – however I did also get some interesting cooking sauces (caribbean condiment, The Ghost Pepper Sauce, The Insanity sauce, Da Bomb Ghost nuts and stuff like that.. really cool).

Then I took the Metro down to Oxford Circus where I had a Belgian waffle and 2 sandwiches for lunch. Then I spent a good time at Debenhams before I took a detour to John Lewis and then I contacted Margaret to see what to bring home for dinner. I found a supermarket and picked up the ingredients we needed for dinner.

Margaret made us a lovely dinner. A chicken Chili Stew. It was soo delicious. Along with lovely wine, Great company and we talked all night long. We did go to bed a lot earlier than yesterday which I am very thankful for :D However it was alovely day!