News in brief

Hello everyone!

I am sorry you have all been wondering where my posts are but can I just say that holidays are too short to be spending time in internet cafés - yes that's right, all quiet on the blog front due to some extremely fine times on the road.

In brief it went like this: I spent 5 days with Andrew in New York doing some fine dining and sightseeing and generally relaxing, didn't expect the temperatures to peak like a standard Syama day, but you can't always be lucky.

Next it was back to Paris where I met Sally and we started out with a spot of salsa dancing and sampling of some fine French cuisine. After a few days in our favourite city - including a surprise and long anticipated catch-up with Clare and Bella - we picked up the Renault Megane and hit the road to commence our first-hand education of the wine regions of northern France. It was an almost completely unplanned adventure, we consulted the Michelin map each morning and hoped for the best - we certainly hit the jackpot a few times with some extremely memorable experiences along the way.

Another night or two in Paris, this time with Annette as well, after which Sal and I parted company. I headed to London on the Eurostar (sooooooo much better than flying) for a whirlwind visit with Cathryn and Mike, and Trudy and Art on a Christmas break planning mission.

I spent my last night back in Paris where Karin and Ned rescued me with a fantastic 8-dish Belleville chinois extravaganza. They took me to their local supermarché the following morning where I discovered a veritable bounty of Pims (stay tuned for that story - it's a ripper - Kate, you will die, baby!), and all the other special treats I managed to squeeze into my suitcase for sanity breaks during this next stint at Syama.

And so what of Syama? It's a sea of new faces, there are now 230 people onsite and before I left I think we maybe had 80 or so people here - so a whole lot of new faces to get used to. But there are still plenty of lovely familiar faces around, thankfully, including - yes, you guessed it - the boys from AM King! Well, they tell me they are only here for another couple of weeks, "welcome to the Hotel California ..."