1999, February – Malta
Package holiday, flight, transfers and a hotel in the middle of the island with a swimming pool. Explored everywhere by bus, including a trip past St Paul’s Bay and over the short sea crossing to Gozo. We also visited the Crusader sites in Valetta and sailed around its harbour. Photo of Ian.
1999, March – Dumfries, Lesley’s 40th birthday
Her friends displayed this banner on the side the road leading to their house in Dumfries; flowers and cake at the joint party with a friend in the church who was celebrating similarly.
1999, May – Kolbotn and Oslo
Abigael’s christening in the American Church in Oslo, as part of the Sunday morning service, followed by a family lunch. Hired a car at Oslo airport and Sandy arranged for us to stay in a neighbour’s house – he and Christina were still in the Norwegian Missionary Society house. Photos of Sandy, Christina and Abigael in the church, Tina and Joyce and Abigael at the reception and the cake.
1999, July – Verona and Venice
Package holiday to the Opera at Verona. Flight to Milan, then bus. Excellent seats for the performance – photo of the theatre filling up, before we went to our seats in the front row. Sight-seeing on the next day included the balcony where Romeo wooed Juliet. On to Venice – photo of Joyce at the Bridge of Sighs – before flying home.
1999, July – Oslo, Germany and Switzerland
Took our car on the ferry from Newcastle to Kristiansand and stayed with Sandy for a week. Then ferry to Keil and drove leisurely south-westwards, through Hamburg, Bremen, Munster (fascinating time looking at the mementos of the Anabaptist insurrection of 1534 (this website, History, Church History – 36 Illustrated Lectures, Lecture 21), picked up the Rhine at Cologne, then up the Mosel to Bernkastel and stayed in the same room in the Drei Konige Hotel as we had for the first week of our honeymoon. Then on to Heidelberg (second week of our honeymoon), and a night in Nuremberg and an interesting sail along its main canal. Then on through Munich to Oberamergau, Garmisch-Partigeren and finally to Interlaken, where we made the Hotel Seeburg, right at the pier at Ringenberg on the Brienzersee, our base. We sailed on both lakes, drove up to Lauterbrunnen, took the railway up the Jungfrau and sailed on the Blausee, before driving back up the Rhine, then to Bruges for the ferry home.
1999, August – Puerto Pollensa, Majorca
First visit with Robin, Frances and their children to the hotel Miramar (photo of it from the pier). Boat trip from the pier to Cala San Vicente and Cap de Formentor. Spent most of the rest of our time on the beach, but also walked along the promenade into the town, for some meals. Hired a car to explore the inland town of Pollença and up to the Formentor Lighthouse.
1999, December – Norway
To spend New Year with Sandy, we flew to Oslo and he met us at the airport. Brought in the New Year, then the skies opened and snow closed all roads around the house. We were eventually sufficiently dug out to get back to the airport.