Travelling to Birmingham was a bit of a nightmare, starting in New York with a taxi-driver running over a cyclist while stopping to pick us up! Luckily the cyclist wasn't too badly hurt, just very angry. On arrival at the airport we waited in a very long line, only to arrive at the counter to find the travel agent had booked our flights on the wrong day! We were booked to fly out the next day. After going back and forth to different counters 3 times, and a stressful wait, they managed to squeeze us onto the very full flight. Then the flight was delayed by 2 hours, so we missed our connecting flight from Frankfurt to Birmingham.....to top it off, a kid vomited on our shoes on the bus taking us from the plane to the terminal. We then had to wait 4 hours at Frankfurt airport so we sat in McDonalds. Finally we made it onto the plane, but on the bus from the airport into Birmingham we managed to get off at the wrong spot and we waited for Shaun's relatives to pick us up...and waited...and then realised we were at the wrong place.
Eventually we managed to meet up with them. Welcome to England! We are staying with Shaun's great-aunt and uncle (Sally and Ray) in Shirley, Solihul. This is a nice area about 20 minutes from the centre of Birmingham, with lots of lovely old brick buildings. Shaun's relatives have been very kind and helpful, giving us lots of information about the area and spoiling us with wonderful home-cooked English food!
On our first day here we made a trip to the supermarket with Sally and Ray so they could buy us food that we would like (very thoughtful). In the afternoon they took us for a drive around the area, to look at one of the canals and show us a Heritage Trust House that is over 400 years old and has an impressive topiary display in the surrounding gardens.
The weather has been typically English - wet, grey and cold. But on Thursday night they had more than a month's worth of rain in 6 hours, which caused chaos in the Midlands - flooded railway tracks (which ended up looking like canals), flooded houses, people stranded in cars and we had a pond in our backyard where the lawn used to be. There was even a mini tornado about 10 miles away. Luckily Solihul is quite high above sea level so we avoided the worst of it.
On Friday we went into Solihul and explored the shopping centre, and spent the bulk of our time there looking at different cell phone contracts - there is a lot more competition over here! Which is good, but also confusing. Hopefully we will have cell phones soon. We went to a nice English pub for lunch - pubs are a lot more popular for socialising during the day. There is also a lot of them! We went shopping, and noticed some of the big brands are a lot cheaper than they are in New Zealand.
Today we have headed into Birmingham to explore the city centre, we are at the Bull Ring at the moment, which is a huge indoor and outdoor shopping centre, including a market with people yelling out their best deals - very entertaining, and some amazing prices. Now we are off to see the canals and what else Birmingham has to offer.
For anyone wanting to get in touch with Shaun, this is his new e-mail address: shaun_davis13@hotmail.co.uk. Otherwise, we really the comments people leave, keep them coming! It stops us from getting too home-sick.
Eventually we managed to meet up with them. Welcome to England! We are staying with Shaun's great-aunt and uncle (Sally and Ray) in Shirley, Solihul. This is a nice area about 20 minutes from the centre of Birmingham, with lots of lovely old brick buildings. Shaun's relatives have been very kind and helpful, giving us lots of information about the area and spoiling us with wonderful home-cooked English food!
On our first day here we made a trip to the supermarket with Sally and Ray so they could buy us food that we would like (very thoughtful). In the afternoon they took us for a drive around the area, to look at one of the canals and show us a Heritage Trust House that is over 400 years old and has an impressive topiary display in the surrounding gardens.
The weather has been typically English - wet, grey and cold. But on Thursday night they had more than a month's worth of rain in 6 hours, which caused chaos in the Midlands - flooded railway tracks (which ended up looking like canals), flooded houses, people stranded in cars and we had a pond in our backyard where the lawn used to be. There was even a mini tornado about 10 miles away. Luckily Solihul is quite high above sea level so we avoided the worst of it.
On Friday we went into Solihul and explored the shopping centre, and spent the bulk of our time there looking at different cell phone contracts - there is a lot more competition over here! Which is good, but also confusing. Hopefully we will have cell phones soon. We went to a nice English pub for lunch - pubs are a lot more popular for socialising during the day. There is also a lot of them! We went shopping, and noticed some of the big brands are a lot cheaper than they are in New Zealand.
Today we have headed into Birmingham to explore the city centre, we are at the Bull Ring at the moment, which is a huge indoor and outdoor shopping centre, including a market with people yelling out their best deals - very entertaining, and some amazing prices. Now we are off to see the canals and what else Birmingham has to offer.
For anyone wanting to get in touch with Shaun, this is his new e-mail address: shaun_davis13@hotmail.co.uk. Otherwise, we really the comments people leave, keep them coming! It stops us from getting too home-sick.
4 comments:
What a horrendous trip to the UK - seems too horrid to be true!!! I hope the weather has perked up a bit by the time I get there. It must make going to Valencia seem even more of an attractive option.
You will remember your trip from the states to England with fondness some time in the future.
We saw the weather on TV it looked terible. Things will only improve
Take care from the forest hillers
Wow, what a disaster! But will be a terrific story for the grandchildren sometime in the distant future ;-)
here i am!
Sounds like you guys are having a great time....depsite the trip to birmingham...you will definitely look back and laugh...i know i'm laughing already!
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