Adult time

I recall an evening last year, not long before we left Balmain when I tore out of our front door, raced down Darling Street and jumped onto the ferry to Circular Quay. I drank in the lights of Luna Park glittering in the dark, and became a part of the city at night as I spent two blissful hours photographing the Opera House lit up with the lights of the Vivid Sydney exhibition. I rarely went out at night, with a young child to look after, especially one who slept fitfully and woke frequently, and almost always wanted her mummy. Going out at night, being part of the outside world for the evening, all the while doing something I loved, was magical and exhilarating.

Last week was our wedding anniversary, and we treated ourselves to a night in a London hotel and tickets to see We Will Rock You. It was the first time in the Littlest Hobo's two and a half years of life that we had left her overnight without one or the other of us being there. And I know that several of my friends who may be reading this will be tutting and rolling their eyes now, but I always have been a bit of a hippy when it comes to parenting, and I make no apology for it. It was great - she's old enough now to understand what is going on and she feel reassured that when we leave her we will come back - she waved us off happily and I wasn't nervous about leaving her.

We've been out for dinner occasionally, and we've each been out separately with friends several times, as well as numerous 'sleepovers' with friends who also have kids where the adults get to party once the kids are asleep, but really we haven't had much opportunity for mutually participated in adult outings for the longest time. We had a great time - I can't remember the last time we went to the theatre, a past-time which I have always enjoyed. Although we've probably checked into more hotels than your average Tom, Dick or Harry in the last couple of years, it was refreshing to just check in, no fuss, without having to make sure that they had put a child bed in the room, that they could cater for children, and one with food intollerences and allergies at that. When we walked into the hotel room we were able to marvel at our upgrade and throw ourselves onto the massive bed without having to first check the room for safety hazards. We ate when we wanted to and what we wanted to and drank enough cocktails, without having to worry about looking after anyone mini, to make the journey to the theatre very giggly. When we left the theatre we walked along Oxford Street, watching people go about their evenings before taking in the Christmas lights of Regent Street from the warmth of our cab, without having to race back to anyone.

It's Mr T's birthday tomorrow, and we're off out for the evening again with my mum in charge of getting her ladyship into bed, and I'm sure that it won't be the only time in the next two and a half weeks as we scrabble to see friends before we leave England's fair shores and our live-in babysitting opportunity is over.

We're quite enjoying our new found occasional freedom, but I'm not too sure how sustainable it is with our plans for the next year. I'm not willing to trust some random babysitter to look after my daughter so that I can go off galavanting around. I'm not that bothered about it - it's not forever, and ultimately we will be fulfilling dreams travelling, and we do have a couple of hours of child free time once she's asleep at night - we're just restricted to wherever our current home may be, and the night life will once again become a distant memory. I was reading in the Lonely Planet Travelling with Children book that between the age of 1 and 3 is the worst time to travel with kids - while I don't agree in many respects, I suppose this is one of the downsides. They need to be at 'home' and in bed by a reasonable time - too old to sleep for hours in a pushchair and too young to stay up late for too many consecutive days.

So I'd love to hear from the rest of the travelling families community - how do you get adult time when you're on the road? Are you able to experience the places you are visiting at night, or do you stick to daytime exploration?

High time to get a little research in motion

So Christmas is done. We enjoyed 4 days house sitting on the Epsom Downs and I'm glad to say that we emerged from our family-combining (my parents and Mr T's sister and family all together on Christmas Day) not just unscathed but declaring it one of the best Christmases ever.

But now all the cookies are eaten, and we've ticked Christmas off the list my mind has moved firmly onto other matters. We leave the UK in just 24 days! Having spent the last 6 months here, on and off, we've found that we took a different approach to our previous jam packed visits when we tore from breakfast to lunch to dinner with friends, only to return back home feeling in need of a holiday. Anyone who has moved countries then gone back to visit will recognise this scenario. While it was nice to see people, it rarely felt like you'd spent enough time with any one person. This 'visit' has been entirely different - we were determined not to leave in the same situation and the luxury of time has made us lax and with a feeling that we had all the time in the world but a reality that didn't match, we have spent a good amount of time with far fewer people than we would have liked, and now we are jostling to fit as much as possible as we can into the next three and a bit weeks. 

But that aside, we have some other important business to address in this time. Those of you who know us will know that we're not the best planners (ahem, understatement maybe?). In 2 months time we will be in New Zealand for three months. That is the plan. But for now we have no flight to get us there. We have considered and discussed whether it would be preferable to travel North to South, or South to North, and we've come to a conclusion that for us, North to South is better. We'd always thought we'd buy a motor home at the beginning of the trip, and then sell it at the end of the trip... but now we're not so sure. Maybe the costs associated with it will be higher than we first assumed, so maybe we'd be better hiring one. Maybe it'll be too cold in a motor home on the South Island in late April//early May, so perhaps we'd be better staying in Bachs. And where do we want to see? We have a few places in mind, but I haven't even bought a lonely planet or rough guide yet, so I'm sure there's plenty more places that should be on our list but aren't.

We've been very lucky that my mums god-daughter is currently trialling a travel researcher, and we are the grateful recipients of that trial. He's come up with some suggestions that will help us on our way, but there's still much more to work out, and we've just got to that stage where we are starting to think that we really ought to do something about it. So I think there's a good few evenings on the internet ahead, looking things up and asking lots of questions to anyone who is vaguely in the know. While we're building up a bit of a following on this blog and our facebook page (woohoo!), I'm not sure there are enough followers yet that I can just sling the questions out there and wait for the answers to come flooding in! 

So our research will consist of drawing on information fom previous visits to New Zealand, searching the internet, using sites like Lonely Planet, Rough Guides, Trip Advisor and Boots n All, as well as official New Zealand tourist web sites, asking questions on forums such as the sites I just mentioned and helpful people who have already offered their advice such as Sarah Bond, a Dunedin based travel writer, Lonely Planet and Rough Guides e-books, and any advice that friends and family who have been there can offer. Where do you get your information from when planning a trip?