Dylan & Tessa's Travel Stories

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2007-12-29T15:36:00.001-08:00

Hey there everyone - sorry this never gets updated
Please go to www.flickr.com/photos/dylandtessa for all our photos

or add us as friends on facebook - come on you know you want to!

Dylan and Tessa

Happy New Year!
On vous souhaite à tous une bonne et heureuse année 2008!!!

Photos

2007-12-29T15:36:00.000-08:00

Hey there everyone - sorry this never gets updated
Please go to www.flckr.com/photos/dylandtessa for all our photos

or add us as friends on facebook - come on you know you want to!

Dylan and Tessa

Happy New Year!
On vous souhaite à tous une bonne et heureuse année 2008!!!

2007-08-12T11:31:00.000-07:00

Well it's August now. Summer is nearly over, and we are all wondering if it ever actually started!?

In light of not wanting to be a reverse whingeing pom, I will concede that the last week has actually been warm and sunny and we are enjoying the outdoors.

Mary and Rene, Tessa's parents recently left us, they've gone back to Australia via Dubai. We had a great 4 weeks with them, with time spent in the Canary Islands (before the island Gran Canaria caught fire) as well as visits through London, and to Bedford also.

Dylan will soon finish up his current contract and will start a new highly anticipated role in the next 3 weeks. Tessa has recently gone permanent in her role as well.

We are off to Germany to attend Jacoco's farewell party in 2 weeks - on the August Bank Holiday weekend.

We are waiting for Rachel and Dylan's Mum Ingrid to arrive in December too.

Check out our photos at www.flickr.com/photos/dylandtessa

And if you are on facebook - look us up!

Cheers
Dylan and Tessa

After Silence....noise....

2007-06-17T10:45:00.000-07:00

Well it has been a very long time since we have posted any news on our blog!
First of all, for all our photos, we now only display them on the following site:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dylandtessa

It has certainly been a rollercoaster over the last almost 2 months - a rollercoaster that includes the following peaks and troughs:

- The birth of Kellis - Sabrina and Princeley's baby girl

- The restructure of 1st Contact - meaning both of our jobs were affected. The company made a decision to outsource a number of their support areas to South Africa, in the current trend of cost savings. I mean, why pay a Marketing Manager in pounds when you can pay them a pittance in South African rand? Obviously, that was their thinking. So as it turned out, we both have now got new jobs, have never looked back, and are far happier now than before.
We made an incredible number of friends at that workplace who we still see now, so if there is a reason for everything, then that was it.

- The arrival of Minh - and the completion of Team Fulham

- Trips to Greenwich, Richmond Park, Hyde Park, the Gherkin, Spitalfields Market, Carnival de Cuba, Camden, the Natural History Museum and the list goes on.

- We said farewell to friends Jess and Hurls and Rossy

- We welcomed Ben, Dave and Simmo to Team Fulham

- We celebrated Louise's house-cooling - in Cranfield - complete with swimming, bbq, beer and a jumping castle

- The arrival of broadband and a laptop at Team Fulham

- We celebrated Wendy's birthday

- We celebrated Dave's birthday

- D attended 7 interviews in one week, now that is crazy!

So don't forget to check through our photos on our new photo site:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dylandtessa

Stay in touch!

Papa Loves Mambo in the former Eastern Bloc

2007-04-12T09:42:00.000-07:00

These photos are in reverse chronological order - but here is the text and the photos - have had trouble getting this updated so rather than keep you waiting here are the photos and some stories:

So many days have passed since we went to Windsor and Eton and what a lot has changed!

2.5 house moves, a trip overseas and visits from friends.

We spent the good part of March working some insane hours and looking for new places to live, after we decided we’d had enough of being told how to wash clothes or when to turn the heater off. Word to the wise – never ever live with your landlord. Even I wouldn’t live with my own tenants!

We explored different parts of London, including Greenwich, Surrey Quays, Putney, Hampstead and Angel. We wanted to see where we could see ourselves living and top of the list was to not have dozens of council flats on your doorstep – which can be hard to avoid in London – and to have shops, cafes, bars and a safe and friendly atmosphere.

While exploring Greenwich, we took the DLR (Docklands Light Railway) to Lewisham – the Dandenong of London – because T wanted to check out the Primark store. Along the High Street D came across a pub named after himself (Dylan’s) which was directly next door to a Reed recruitment agency. Weird huh?

As it turned out our saviours in London – Mel, Ben and Eveline came to our rescue once again and allowed us to doss on their couch until we could sort out a place to live. Our other saviours – my cousins - also came to our rescue and Louise and Paul came all the way to London and helped us to move from Bow to the Bush (She Bu).

We spent a weekend away in Bedford celebrating my cousin Gwen’s birthday which was great fun.

Our stay on the couch in She Bu was fleeting, as before too long, friends from work offered us the chance to rent a room in their flat in Fulham. We moved in shortly after – by bus – great fun! (joke)

Since then we found a flat of our own and we moved in last week. It’s in Fulham also and it will be home to the soon to be formed Team Fulham of Dylan, Tessa and Minh. (MT arriving 29th April)

We had a very short visit from Jacoco and Micha in late March and we had a few drinks in the evening with them and the Scotsman.

Our first overseas trip since we arrived was at Easter. We flew out of Stanstead airport on Good Friday – en route to Altenburg, Germany. It is the smallest airport I’ve ever been too – it’s even smaller than Plaine Coraille Airport in Rodrigues!! The Ryan Air flight we took is the only flight into the ex-military airbase airport each day.

We spent Good Friday strolling through the streets of Chemnitz, where Jacoco, Micha, Stefan and Anna live and taking some touristy and stoopid shots! Chemnitz was officially known as Karlmarxstadt during the GDR or Eastern Bloc period, and only in 1990 when Eastern and Western Germany were re-unified did it become Chemnitz. It is full of 70’s and 80’s soviet architecture, and home to the biggest bronze carved head in the world – of Karl Marx himself.

On Easter Saturday, we headed to Dresden for the day. It is so amazing to see a city that was almost completely razed to ground, being rebuilt stone by stone to its former glory. It’s an amazing city, which despite its years of history and the numerous historical buildings, has a new and youthful feeling to it.

On Easter Saturday night, we enjoyed the company of Micha’s friends Sandra, Andreas and Kevin. And Papa loved Mambo!

On Easter Sunday, Jacoco had prepared a breakfast spread – typically German, with crusty rolls, loads of cheeses, cold meats, jams etc was great! When Micha, Stefan and Anna arrived we had an Easter egg hunt and pigged out on German shokolade!

Then we learned how to play Ligretto and had a few games of poker, while enjoying German wine and beer and eating Russian Shaslicks and potato salad – thanks to Anna and Jacoco.

On Easter Monday after a relaxing brunch and cup of RoiBos tea on the balcony at Micha’s overlooking the city of Chemnitz, we headed back to the little airport for our flight back to London – home.

Windsor and Eton

2007-03-17T05:01:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone, some photos from Windsor last weekend! can you spot the Queen?

New Photos from LondON

2007-03-03T02:23:00.001-08:00

Here are some photos from London from the last few weeks!
In reverse chronological order...

Last weekend we spent Sunday with Sabrina and Princeley and went to St James' Park and Buckinham Palace. We also went to see the changing of the Queen's Guard.

There are squirrels everywhere!

The Old Queen's place...

F

Family name in lights??

"Our Hood" (Our tube station)

At the Tate Modern

St Pauls from across the river..

Southwark Cathedral and Borough Market

Pies, Peas and Mash at Spitalfields Market..

Our photo wall at home

Out in Soho - Linda, Tessa, Janette and Wendy

Out in Soho - Tom,David, Dylan and Anthony

Greenwich Village

Sabrina and Princeley came over to our place for lunch!

Mind the Gap

2007-02-28T10:41:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone,

Seems like I am always apologising for not writing on this often. But won't do that this time.

Just an update on our lives, but without photos sorry! There I apologised!

We're busy caught up in regular lifestyles of working monday to friday - how boring - but we're doing it in one of the most exciting cities in the world so hey - that makes it way more interesting.

Slowly adapting to the English world - and no longer laughing at 'Mind the Gap', or cringing at the 45 minute wait to post a letter. (Can I help you? Dere)

Learning all sorts of English words and phrases like Chav and Flip Flops but not losing the aussie accent... But more than English words and sayings we are learning South African ones - like shame, Just Now and lekker and bru etc. (Thats what happens when you work somewhere that more than half the staff are South African!)

Days are getting longer, its getting dark now around 5.30pm, and its not so cold. We have a forecast of sun for the next 3 days so that's promising.

Looking forward to the arrival in London of one Mr Minh Truong in April, and enjoyed having Jacoco visit last week!

About to head out into the very strong winds and head home.

Take care everyone and MOIND THE GEP!

News from LondonTown

2007-02-13T09:22:00.000-08:00

It’s hard to believe that it’s already been a month and a few days since we left Mauritius and arrived here in the UK.

Funny how sliding back into the routine of going to work Monday to Friday makes the time pass quickly. Can’t believe I’ve already done two weeks of work and Tessa’s done 3!

We’ve both had bouts of a cold or flu and Dylan is still a bit sick. Tessa’s much better. The worst part is being sick on the weekend! It meant that Saturday was pretty boring day at home. But at the same time was good to relax in the warmth and get some stuff done. On Sunday though we got to have lunch with Sabrina and Princely at our place!

Last week it snowed – which isn’t the first time since we’ve been here – the first was around the 23rd of Jan. The first time it snowed was when we were staying with Ben and Mel.

The next time was last week and we had to walk to the tube in the snow which was pretty cool. We got covered in it. It actually snowed non stop – even in the centre of London till about 10am.

Now as promised here are some photos from the UK and London that I have now been able to upload.

For my birthday, we had a lunch at Gwen’s house and we had a cake.

In the evening we headed to London and Tessa took me out for dinner.

On the next day after our recruitment agency interviews, we met up with Sabrina and Princeley and saw some famous London icons like Trafalgar Square, the London Eye, Picadilly Circus and Leicester Square.

We also caught up Tessa’s friend Alison and had dinner with Mel and Justine.

Over the days that Tessa was working Dylan went out and saw a few famous sights including Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, St Paul’s cathedral, Tower Bridge Buckingham Palace, the British Museum and even stumbled across a Mauritian supermarket in Soho!!

Our first weekend after a working week – last weekend – we spent Saturday around the market near our flat – about 3 min walk! And then to Docklands, and into Covent Garden market and Soho. In the evening we went out with Mel, Ben and some of their friends in Shepherds Bush.

On Sunday we went and took some obligatory tourist shots at Big Ben, Westminster Abbey and the London Eye.

Then we went and caught up with Sabrina and Princeley at their house and had dinner.

Here’s a photo of our other flatmate Penny!

Looking forward to Jacoco’s arrival in the UK next week – for the weekend and we’re going to catch up.

One thing we’ve been most surprised about is how fast news travels from here – people were checking we were ok as soon as it snowed and the letter bombs went off. I think Australia is more interested in the rest of the world then the rest of the world is about Australia – we never hear much news about Australia – unless it’s about John Farnham having underwear thrown at him and Dame Kiri Te Kanawa not liking it……..

Stay in touch and I hope I’ve now fixed the comments section.

Tessa and Dylan

So Much to tell You

2007-01-22T05:53:00.000-08:00

Well, I am really sorry that this has taken so long to update - but we have been travelling and enjoying things away from the computer!!
Anyway, I am going to step through chronologically all that we did from the last post to now - some pictures from London to come, once I can load them on.

So just before Christmas we had the chance to enjoy the hospitality of our friend from Melbourne - Brian's family in Coromandel. Thank you!

On the 23rd December, we had a picnic at Flic en Flac - and we had another large group go along. There was a cyclone out at sea that day so the water was pretty churned up and lots of waves - for those that know Flic en Flac - its not normal!
Also, we got to see Corinne - aka Brian La Levre's sister!

That evening, we had the pleasure of attending Mary Jane and Yannick's engagement. Congratulations guys!

Christmas Eve was a crazy evening - that went until 6am. It was heaps of fun. We celebrated early at Castel with Mary, Rene, Vince and the family. And then head up to Eau Coulee for the evening - where we had a sega theme and about 6-8 courses of seafood dishes - was great. Virginie's neighbours will never forget me blowing the party hooter at 5 in the morning......

On Christmas day we celebrated with the whole family at Castel.

We then started what about 2 weeks of eating and drinking non stop!
We enjoyed the hospitality of Berty and Shantal, John and Marlene, Fidou and Ti Jacques and Francoise.

We also had a great dinner out at Ed Grill with the Collard family and enjoyed seeing Tessa, Arielle, Vissen and Marie Claude singing karaoke.

On Saturday the 30th, we headed down to Ebene to see our friends Gilliane and Louis from Australia - and to watch Gilliane's uncle Serge Lebrasse perform at the shopping centre. Serge got Tessa and Gilliane up to dance.

In the evening we had Francesca's birthday and then a group of us went out to Queen's club in Quatre Bornes. Let's just say I'm never taking a bottle of water on to the dance floor again!!

New Years Eve was like being in Baghdad! The sound of the firecrackers, fireworks and all other petards was incredible! We had a great night again shared between Castel and then Eau Coulee - another 5.30am finish!

We spent new years day at Castel with all the family and also enjoyed the company of Jean-Francois and Francois from France.

On Tuesday the 2nd, we had a great lunch at Fatma, Syd and Tante Anne's house - with Ali, Priscilla, Ridwan and Ginette. And then we head up to Pereybere beach and dropped in to Balaclava - to Tessa's cousin Pam's incredible house!

Ali and Priscilla took us to see Port Louis by night from Citadel.

On the 3rd, we spent a rainy but great day at Casela and Le Morne. The weather cleared up in the afternoon and so we all swam.

On friday the 5th, we had lunch at Pollo and Sheila's house in Rose Hill and then dinner had dinner at Johan and Fiona's house. Have you ever tasted Rum from La Reunion with fruit inside and an alcohol content of 49%? It was awesome..

On Saturday the 6th we had a huge picnic with all the family at Jardins Balfour. Tessa organised a cake to celebrate my birthday (14th Jan) and Mary and Rene's wedding aniversary. It was great.

Check out the whole (or about 3/4) of the family!!

Sunday was packing day - and it did actually take all day. which is why we had about 60kgs over weight leaving Mauritius on the Monday!

We left Mauritius on the 8th. It was as exciting as it was sad and vice versa.
We managed to get on of the brand new airbuses - that run between London and Mauritius. It was so good - the individual screens are touchscreens and you can pick from 20 movies to watch - which you can rewind, ffwd, pause etc.

When we arrived in Heathrow - to a surprisingly mild evening - we were shocked at the speed of my visa processing and also the fact that no one cared for what we had to declare - which means we could have brought loads more alcohol and achards etc.

Since we arrived we've spent some great time with Dylan's Aunt Gladys and his cousins Gwen and Karl, Louise and Celeste. They have been so welcoming and generous. They even organised a birthday lunch on the 14th for Dylan complete with cake, and in the evening Tessa took Dylan out for dinner in London.

We spent about 5 days in London over the last fortnight having interviews and flat hunting. We've managed to find a flat and we're moving in on Wednesday evening.
Its in East Central london - in a place called Bow/Mile End.
Its a brand new apartment and it's very big (which is unusal in London) and very modern - also unusual.

Its sharing with 1 girl - the owner - who's really really nice. (she's already invited us to her mums for curry)

Tessa started work today - I am still unemployed!!
But I have an interview tomorrow for an - at 1st Contact - same company Tessa's working for - but she's running seminars and training, my role is in their Business Development team.

We're staying at the moment with Ben and Mel (from Melbourne) and their flat mate Evelyn and they've been really nice to let us sleep on their couch for a few nights.

We also caught up with Sabrina and Princeley (Tessa's cousins from Mauritius) who live here last week. And also Justine, a friend of Tessa's from Melbourne.

Will now try and stay up to date with info!!
(London and UK photos to come)

Ps: Hi to Kath and Guy and thanks for the comments!

Weddings, Engagements, Anything

2006-12-19T05:09:00.000-08:00

Since we've been in Mauritius we've learnt a new Creole word for a "user" (i.e. people who use others or take advantage of them) it's a "Bateur Bus" - And Tessa and Dylan felt like real Bateurs Bus on the eve of the Wedding! We were surprised with an engagement cake and toast with the whole family - who were gathered for the Wedding eve get together.

On Wednesday the 13th, it was the wedding of Joelle and Wesley. Tessa and Dylan were part of the Bridal party (each of us one of 9 bridesmaids or groomsmen!)

It was a great wedding and the reception was heaps of fun. One of the best parts was having Stephan Buckland drive the wedding car, and having Nancy Derougere sing at the reception.

On the day after we had a "lendemain mariage" get together - everyone was pretty tired.

On the Friday of last week our friends Mary Jane and Yannick, with their niece Serena took us out for the day, we went to Souillac, Rochester Falls, through the south to Le Morne, Chamarel and the Black River Gorges.

On Saturday we (40 or so) of us went for a picnic to Blue Bay - it was a really good day, it was sunny and hot and we swam nearly all day.
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On Sunday we were invited to the christening of the son of family friends of Tessa's family.

On Monday night we were spoilt by the D'Avrincourt family! Magali came and picked us and drove us to their house in Mountain Long and we got to have dinner with Liseby, Magali and Sylvain. (Only Patrice and Richard were missing - Well Richard was probably sleeping at the time in Australia!)

Getting ready for Christmas. It really doesn't feel like Christmas at all - not to say that there isn't chrsitmas Decorations around etc - but without the familiarity of Christmas in Australia - it doesn't quite feel like Christmas.

Tessa's Birthday - 9th December 2006

2006-12-10T20:21:00.000-08:00

It's funny how being away from routine and familiarity things can happen, but don't really feel like they do at home.

Today was Tessa's birthday but it didn't feel as much like her birthday as it might have had at home - well that was in the morning anyway and then the day got started!

Well the day actually started the night before - Mary, Rene, and Vince came over to where we are staying at the Collard's house in Eau-Coulée (with Marie-Claude, Jacques, Jerome and Arielle)and we had a dinner (carri poule, du riz blanc and vegetables). We were still up at midnight so we all had a glass of wine and sang happy birthday to tessa.

Saturday we set out early for Trou D'Eau Douce, and from there our boat was waiting to take us (15 of us) around for the day.

We sailed out across the sea and had a drink - yes early in the morning! We sailed to Grande Riviere Sud-Est.

When we got there we transfered into a small boat and it took us up the river to the waterfalls, the boat went right up and under the falls.

Then we went back to our pirate ship as we called it and head back out to the sea and we anchored off the coast to go diving/snorkelling. It was great.

Then we had a grillade for lunch - BBQ chicken, fish and salad.

The the boat took us to Ile aux Cerfs where we spent the afternoon swimming until the boat took us back to Trou D'Eau Douce.

In the evening all the cousins went to Johan and Fiona's new house in Trou aux Cerfs and we had drinks and food. It was a long day on the boat and so most of us flaked out by around midnight!

Postscript:
When we arrived home on Friday after a full day of looking for silver shoes for Tessa to wear as bridesmaid in the wedding - for those that know Mauritius we went to Rose Hill, Quatre Bornes and Port Louis from 9.30 to 4pm and only at 4.15 at a new shop in Port Louis did we find a pair of silver high heels that were Tessa's size (10) needless to say we learnt 2 things: 1. Mauritians must all have small feet and 2. Vince and I are NEVER going shoe shopping again. Anyway - when we arrived home that evening there was an incredible bunch of flowers to say Congratulations that were sent to us by Bonnie, Wayne, Kate, Lauren and Daniel and we were very happy!

Finally some news from us!

2006-12-07T02:55:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone,

1000 apologies for the delay in updating our blog - but we have been to busy experiencing Mauritius and Rodrigues to be on a computer!

It has been an unusual month for us.

Obviously as most of you know we had a big farewell party and we loved seeing you all and saying goodbye.

Not soon after,Monday 13th November, Dylan's Grandma - Theresa Rose Fonseca - passed away peacefully. It was an incredibly emotional last 10 days before we left and we miss her a lot. None the less, we spent a lot of time with Dylan's family and got to really say goodbye before leaving.

On Tuesday 21st November we flew out of Melbourne at about 12.15pm - for those of you who know Air Mauritius you will know that 1hour and 10 mins late is not too bad!!

We only just made it through as we were 33 kgs overweight in total - but it all got checked through and we paid NOTHING in excess baggage!!
Thanks to Rachel, Ingrid, Egbert, Mozma, Sasha, Minh and Ben for farewelling us at the airport!

At the Airport...

We arrived in Mauritius on the same day and spent the first couple of days settling in, eating and drinking! and getting over the jetlag.

The first Saturday we were here was Tessa's Aunty Jacqueline's 60th birthday and it was huge party with all the family.

"Tessa, Dylan and Jacqueline"

"Les Cousines"

"Les Cousins"

The next day was Tessa's cousin's daughter's first Birthday.

"Tessa and Najma"

In the second week we went here and there and visited people, we went to the beach at Flic en Flac and also at Perybere.

On Friday the 1st Dec, we went to Rodrigues for 4 days, and stayed at Le Tamaris in Port Mathurin.

We visited Ile Aux Cocos and also the Cavernes Patates. On the last day we went to St Francois, Cotton Bay and Anse Ally.

"Dylan and Tessa at Ile Aux Cocos"

And we had the chance to get caught up in all the demonstrations for the elections - which they have so much more fun with then we do in Australia!!!

"Part of the demonstration"

We also got to meet Corinne's cousin as he drove us to Ile Aux Cocos!!

On Wednesday we went to stay the night at the Hilton Hotel at Flic en Flac - which is incredible!

And it was there that we got engaged!

We are now getting ready for Tessa's cousin Joelle's wedding next week which we are both in the bridal party for, then Christmas, New Years etc etc!

Stay in touch all.

Dylan and Tessa

2 Weeks

2006-11-06T15:38:00.000-08:00

Just in case you didn't know - we leave in 2 weeks.

Not that much left to do - but we HAVE to sell our car!
Go to www.carsales.com.au and search for rego: QXD630

The Countdown

2006-09-28T17:18:00.000-07:00

It has come down to 7 weeks before we depart.
And with only 4.5 weeks till we finish work, the atmosphere in the air for us is one of extreme excitement.

These are the two deck chairs waiting for us on our holiday.

Tatts me outta here.

2006-08-20T18:13:00.000-07:00

Hey there.

Well there are only exactly 3 months to the date till Tessa and I fly out of Australia and head to Mauritius for 6 weeks of fun and relaxation. And then to the UK for work and holidays.

It has however, been a sad weekend with the passing of Tessa's aunty Maude, in Mauritius.

Here are some photos of Tessa and I performing with Brian Domingue and Sego and Toto Lebrasse at the Tattersalls George Awards on Thursday night.

Pako Festa

2006-03-02T13:48:00.000-08:00

Here are some pics of Tessa and I when we performed at the Geelong Street Festival.

Dylan's 25th Birthday

2006-01-23T14:50:00.000-08:00

The final event in our Summer Social Calendar! Dylan's 25th Birthday. We had a party in our garden at Oakleigh South. Here are some photos.
The final event in our Summer Social Calendar! Dylan's 25th Birthday. We had a party in our garden at Oakleigh South. Here are some photos.

The final event in our Summer Social Calendar! Dylan's 25th Birthday.
We had a party in our garden at Oakleigh South.

Here are some photos.

Tessa's Birthday 9th December 2005

2006-01-23T14:11:00.000-08:00

Well in December it was Tessa's 28th Birthday. I know it's a bit delayed but here are some photos from the night.

Tessa's birthday was at So' Bar in Melbourne. A funky Brazilian bar which serves up the best Caparinha cocktails in Melbourne.

Well in December it was Tessa's 28th Birthday. I know it's a bit delayed but here are some photos from the night.

Tessa's birthday was at So' Bar in Melbourne. A funky Brazilian bar which serves up the best Caparinha cocktails in Melbourne.

Pictures of our house

2006-01-11T19:49:00.000-08:00

Here are some images from our house - at Christmas, the Kitchen and the Front.

Bonne Annee a tout le monde!

2006-01-11T19:09:00.000-08:00

Hi

We thought we would set this up so that we can stay in touch with all our friends and family in Australia and around the world - Mauritius, France, NZ, England and everywhere in between!

To start with we have included some photos from our New Year's Eve at Carnivale - at the Nepean Hotel in Moorabbin. And some photos from our new (we've been there 5 months now!) house in Oakleigh South.