10 more sleeps

On September 4th we are leaving on the trip of a lifetime. Neither of us has been to most of these places previously, so we are VERY excited. We'll be away for nearly 9 weeks, heading first for Ireland, then England, France & Italy.

We have been planning this trip for a year but there still seems to be an awful lot to do at the last minute!Our plan is to keep this blog as a travel diary, for our own benefit, as well as anyone who is interested enough to come along for the journey. We won't have internet access all the time, but I will try to update the blog whenever I can.

We are getting very excited - this is really going to happen. Our motto for the trip (courtesy of Rick Steves, travel writer) is to "be fanatacially positive and militantly optimistic".What's the key to enjoying travel? "One of the fundamental things is, if it's not to your liking, change your liking," says Steves. "This is a chance for us to immerse ourselves in something that's different."