Friday, June 28, 2013
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
End of June
The holiday is coming to an end and I am
going to miss spending all my time with these three. Alhamdullilah we had the opportunity to travel together and I love spending two weeks travelling with these little people. Wish we can do it again someday:) waiting for them to grow a little older so that we can go to that special place we are yearning to go to!
going to miss spending all my time with these three. Alhamdullilah we had the opportunity to travel together and I love spending two weeks travelling with these little people. Wish we can do it again someday:) waiting for them to grow a little older so that we can go to that special place we are yearning to go to!
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Adventure with Three - part 3
And so I've caught my breath and will now continue.
After taking the overnight train, we reached Munich in the early hours of the morning. We chose Munich to be our base area as our flight out is from Munich. Munich was hot, 31 degrees to be exact. It was a pretty drastic change from London and Amsterdam which was about 12 degrees. So very soon our jackets were left untouched.
We checked in and then rested for a while before we met Alim's brother who was on honeymoon in Europe too. We went to the English Garden, had a little picnic and the kids ran around for a bit. It was nice except for the hot hot weather.
We decided to take it slow from here coz as expected by now we were getting tired and losing steam abit so it was cue for us to rest and take things super slow. We rented a car the next day and decided to visit the Neushwanstein Castle which is one of the castles which inspired Walt Disney to come up with the Disney logo. Of course, Alisha was super excited and the kids were thrilled to enter into an actual castle. The castle was perched beautifully on a hill and the hike up wasn't particularly something I would like to do again but the view from the castle was really pretty! The castle tour was interesting but rather short.
After a tiring hike, all we wanted was a nice cool drink and and ice cream. We walked around a bit and found a really beautiful lake, Lake Alpsee. There happened to be a nice restaurant overlooking the lake and I decided to have a small belated birthday celebration and fathers day dinner for Alim. The view, the ice cream and the walk along the lake was really nice. :)
We then drove home passed beautiful greenery and pretty little villages.
The next day we checked out from Munich after a 2 nights stay and decided to do a 2 hour drive to Innsbruck, Austria.
We were torn between driving to Salzburg and Innsbruck. Although I think Salzburg is just as beautiful but I am glad we ended up in Innsbruck. In Innsbruck all I wanted to do was stay in a really pretty cottage in some village with super awesome view and just not do anything. We managed to find this really awesome place in Booking. Com and our apartment had a really beautiful view of the mountains and greenery. It was quiet and pretty.
Then poor Alim got sick for 2 days, vomitted non stop. He might have caught the bug somewhere we have no idea where from. We were lucky our apartment was near to everything which we needed. We went to the doctor and he received an injection to stop the vomitting. He rested for two days. We bought all our supplies at a nearby supermarket and I somehow managed to make some porridge for him and the kids. As the plan was to rest and chill at the cottage, rest we did as Alim needed time to recover. The good thing was there's wide open field, a playground and a swimming pool at the cottage which managed to keep the kids occupied but mostly they enjoyed playing in the apartment the most. For me, the view was more than enough:)
Once Alim got better, we drove around Innsbruck city. It was a pretty sight to see all the buildings standing against a backdrop of mountains. Reminds me of Switzerland a bit. After our little cottage respite, we drove back to Munich to
do some last minute shopping for a day and then catch our late flight the next day.
On our last day in Munich, we went around the city centre at Marienplatz, Maximilanatrasse and drove around and ate nice Indian food after getting sick of kebab throughout the trip.
Soon it was time to go home. And that pretty much was the end of the crazy adventure. It was crazy because many things were not planned properly. We booked accomodations a day before we actually check out from another hotel so we were constantly relying on the hotel's free wi-Fi. Car rental was also done over there and we basically planned our itinery on a day to day basis.
Alisha and Irfan were wonderful. They were adaptable, easily entertained and enjoyed every experience they had. Irfan called it the amazing race because we were at times rushing to catch the next train, the next tour and so on. Alisha was a little picky when it comes to food but the good thing is she was weaned off the bottle finally because we didn't bring her milk for this trip. Hope it stays that way.
Shahid on the other hand was like a squirmy worm as he always is. Sometimes when we were tired, he was not and we just have to keep a vigilant eye on him. He was pretty alright when we were on the go, usually he will be asleep or sitting quietly in his stroller. Making milk and changing diapers were the usual order of the day. :)
There were many silly stories that we will remember from this adventure. Till the next, I hope irfan and Alisha will remember this trip for as long as they can.
It was surely memorable. Now, time to get back to this time zone. We are still adjusting. The kids fell asleep at 4 am last night and woke up at 2 pm! It 'll take some time.
It's 6 am now. Im taking sometime to adjust too. Maybe tomorrow. For now, Good night!
After taking the overnight train, we reached Munich in the early hours of the morning. We chose Munich to be our base area as our flight out is from Munich. Munich was hot, 31 degrees to be exact. It was a pretty drastic change from London and Amsterdam which was about 12 degrees. So very soon our jackets were left untouched.
We checked in and then rested for a while before we met Alim's brother who was on honeymoon in Europe too. We went to the English Garden, had a little picnic and the kids ran around for a bit. It was nice except for the hot hot weather.
We decided to take it slow from here coz as expected by now we were getting tired and losing steam abit so it was cue for us to rest and take things super slow. We rented a car the next day and decided to visit the Neushwanstein Castle which is one of the castles which inspired Walt Disney to come up with the Disney logo. Of course, Alisha was super excited and the kids were thrilled to enter into an actual castle. The castle was perched beautifully on a hill and the hike up wasn't particularly something I would like to do again but the view from the castle was really pretty! The castle tour was interesting but rather short.
After a tiring hike, all we wanted was a nice cool drink and and ice cream. We walked around a bit and found a really beautiful lake, Lake Alpsee. There happened to be a nice restaurant overlooking the lake and I decided to have a small belated birthday celebration and fathers day dinner for Alim. The view, the ice cream and the walk along the lake was really nice. :)
We then drove home passed beautiful greenery and pretty little villages.
The next day we checked out from Munich after a 2 nights stay and decided to do a 2 hour drive to Innsbruck, Austria.
We were torn between driving to Salzburg and Innsbruck. Although I think Salzburg is just as beautiful but I am glad we ended up in Innsbruck. In Innsbruck all I wanted to do was stay in a really pretty cottage in some village with super awesome view and just not do anything. We managed to find this really awesome place in Booking. Com and our apartment had a really beautiful view of the mountains and greenery. It was quiet and pretty.
Then poor Alim got sick for 2 days, vomitted non stop. He might have caught the bug somewhere we have no idea where from. We were lucky our apartment was near to everything which we needed. We went to the doctor and he received an injection to stop the vomitting. He rested for two days. We bought all our supplies at a nearby supermarket and I somehow managed to make some porridge for him and the kids. As the plan was to rest and chill at the cottage, rest we did as Alim needed time to recover. The good thing was there's wide open field, a playground and a swimming pool at the cottage which managed to keep the kids occupied but mostly they enjoyed playing in the apartment the most. For me, the view was more than enough:)
Once Alim got better, we drove around Innsbruck city. It was a pretty sight to see all the buildings standing against a backdrop of mountains. Reminds me of Switzerland a bit. After our little cottage respite, we drove back to Munich to
do some last minute shopping for a day and then catch our late flight the next day.
On our last day in Munich, we went around the city centre at Marienplatz, Maximilanatrasse and drove around and ate nice Indian food after getting sick of kebab throughout the trip.
Soon it was time to go home. And that pretty much was the end of the crazy adventure. It was crazy because many things were not planned properly. We booked accomodations a day before we actually check out from another hotel so we were constantly relying on the hotel's free wi-Fi. Car rental was also done over there and we basically planned our itinery on a day to day basis.
Alisha and Irfan were wonderful. They were adaptable, easily entertained and enjoyed every experience they had. Irfan called it the amazing race because we were at times rushing to catch the next train, the next tour and so on. Alisha was a little picky when it comes to food but the good thing is she was weaned off the bottle finally because we didn't bring her milk for this trip. Hope it stays that way.
Shahid on the other hand was like a squirmy worm as he always is. Sometimes when we were tired, he was not and we just have to keep a vigilant eye on him. He was pretty alright when we were on the go, usually he will be asleep or sitting quietly in his stroller. Making milk and changing diapers were the usual order of the day. :)
There were many silly stories that we will remember from this adventure. Till the next, I hope irfan and Alisha will remember this trip for as long as they can.
It was surely memorable. Now, time to get back to this time zone. We are still adjusting. The kids fell asleep at 4 am last night and woke up at 2 pm! It 'll take some time.
It's 6 am now. Im taking sometime to adjust too. Maybe tomorrow. For now, Good night!
Monday, June 24, 2013
Adventure with Three- part 2
A recap of our little adventure so that my forgetful mind will not forget.
As the previous decisions, the destination of this trip was confirmed very late, 2 days before the trip to be exact. We just knew we wanted to fly into Heathrow and out of Munich and everything in between was just a sketchy plan. We were ready to be dead tired, realistically travelling with one infant is already an exhausting feat, what more with another 7 and 4 year old to add to the fun. But we just could not bring ourselves to leave them. Maybe one day we will have the courage to because realistically it will be a more relaxing trip without them. But for now, we can't yet.
And also because, the holidays are precious moments where we can spend all our time bonding with our children so it's pretty hard for me to miss this golden opportunity and be apart from them for 2 weeks.
Ok so I think this will be a super long entry considering I have not even started on our itinery! Moving on!
So we confirmed our flight tickets a day before the trip. We booked our accomodation for London the night before we leave. Of course I don't recommend this last minute stuff. Of coz the best is to get everything planned especially when kids are involved. But I guess at times not booking accomodtion first also leaves you with the flexibility to make changes and actually accomodtion are aplenty and we didn't end up in a situation where there was no accomodation at all! But still, I don't recommend it at all!
So we spent 3 days in London. 1 day to rest after a long flight. The next day we went to the public library and then see Harry Potter! We love it so much that I really recommend every Harry Potter fan to travel to London to see this actual set and be awed by it all. Another day was spent walking around Oxford Street and Harrods. All the touristy stuff was done the previous trip so we kept London short and sweet.
We then took the Eurostar to Amsterdam. Amsterdam city centre was really busy and there were so many shopping alleys. We love the beautiful canals. We took a really nice, see-it-all tour to see the best of Holland where they brought us to the village of Marken and Volandem to see the windmills, the beautiful houses, cheese factory, pottery making centre and clog factory. The kids learnt a lot as they watched the demonstrations. The highlight of the tour was going to Moduradam where we saw a miniature of all the key buildings in holland. It was amazing! The kids were super excited. We also had an opportunity to go to Rijk Museum and saw Van Gogh's work and Rembrandt's Night Watch. I thought Irfan will not be the least interested but he was asking so many questions and going around the museum looking at all the beautiful pieces. Unfortunately Alisha was asleep throughout so she didn't have the chance to see them. We also did the canal cruise and went through the numerous canals in Amsterdam. We love Amsterdam. I like the beautiful villages with the canals running through and the windmills and clogs give a unique feel to Holland compared to other European countries. What we probably will never see are the tulips. I'm sure holland will be super gorgeous when it's the tulips season.
We then took the overnight train to Munich. The kids loved the experience of sleeping in a train and I was excited too! They enjoyed looking out at the view before the sun sets at 10pm and sleeping on the top bunk bed was the highlight for them. For me, it was kind of squeezy and uncomfortable but it was an experience sharing the moment with the kids. we played cards and tell stories when dusk sets in.
Will talk about Munich and our drive to Austria in the next entry!
And pics later too!
As the previous decisions, the destination of this trip was confirmed very late, 2 days before the trip to be exact. We just knew we wanted to fly into Heathrow and out of Munich and everything in between was just a sketchy plan. We were ready to be dead tired, realistically travelling with one infant is already an exhausting feat, what more with another 7 and 4 year old to add to the fun. But we just could not bring ourselves to leave them. Maybe one day we will have the courage to because realistically it will be a more relaxing trip without them. But for now, we can't yet.
And also because, the holidays are precious moments where we can spend all our time bonding with our children so it's pretty hard for me to miss this golden opportunity and be apart from them for 2 weeks.
Ok so I think this will be a super long entry considering I have not even started on our itinery! Moving on!
So we confirmed our flight tickets a day before the trip. We booked our accomodation for London the night before we leave. Of course I don't recommend this last minute stuff. Of coz the best is to get everything planned especially when kids are involved. But I guess at times not booking accomodtion first also leaves you with the flexibility to make changes and actually accomodtion are aplenty and we didn't end up in a situation where there was no accomodation at all! But still, I don't recommend it at all!
So we spent 3 days in London. 1 day to rest after a long flight. The next day we went to the public library and then see Harry Potter! We love it so much that I really recommend every Harry Potter fan to travel to London to see this actual set and be awed by it all. Another day was spent walking around Oxford Street and Harrods. All the touristy stuff was done the previous trip so we kept London short and sweet.
We then took the Eurostar to Amsterdam. Amsterdam city centre was really busy and there were so many shopping alleys. We love the beautiful canals. We took a really nice, see-it-all tour to see the best of Holland where they brought us to the village of Marken and Volandem to see the windmills, the beautiful houses, cheese factory, pottery making centre and clog factory. The kids learnt a lot as they watched the demonstrations. The highlight of the tour was going to Moduradam where we saw a miniature of all the key buildings in holland. It was amazing! The kids were super excited. We also had an opportunity to go to Rijk Museum and saw Van Gogh's work and Rembrandt's Night Watch. I thought Irfan will not be the least interested but he was asking so many questions and going around the museum looking at all the beautiful pieces. Unfortunately Alisha was asleep throughout so she didn't have the chance to see them. We also did the canal cruise and went through the numerous canals in Amsterdam. We love Amsterdam. I like the beautiful villages with the canals running through and the windmills and clogs give a unique feel to Holland compared to other European countries. What we probably will never see are the tulips. I'm sure holland will be super gorgeous when it's the tulips season.
We then took the overnight train to Munich. The kids loved the experience of sleeping in a train and I was excited too! They enjoyed looking out at the view before the sun sets at 10pm and sleeping on the top bunk bed was the highlight for them. For me, it was kind of squeezy and uncomfortable but it was an experience sharing the moment with the kids. we played cards and tell stories when dusk sets in.
Will talk about Munich and our drive to Austria in the next entry!
And pics later too!
Monday, June 17, 2013
Our number 1
To the most wonderful father in the world. Thank you for giving your all for the kids. They are indeed lucky to have an involved, loving and knowledgable father like you. You have done so much for all three of them and they love you so much!
Happy Father's Day. :)
Happy Father's Day. :)
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Adventure with Three - Day 2 London
Free wi-fi at the hotel. It's 3 am here in London. All of them are asleep. I was up to give milk and thought I'll squeeze in a short update before I get back to sleep.
We started the day early with nice English breakfast. We then had a nice cool walk to the bustop, heading for Victoria. Itinery for the day was to go to Warner bros studio to see Harry Potter studio set! We were super excited! A bus was scheduled to pick us up at Victoria at 11 and bring us to Warner bros. We reached the bus meeting point early and spotted Victoria public library! So we went in and spend some wonderful time in there reading. We love the library:)
Irfan picked out a book about London and we read. Oh how apt! Shahid had time to crawl around and made friends with cute pair of twins! The only downside for the kids was they couldn't borrow any books:(
The Harry potter set was beyond imagination! It was super exciting for me and the kids too!!! To actually walked at the exact location and see how the movie was made was both educational and fascinating for the kids and me. they now know that it's a lot of hard work and ingenuity to produce a film. Irfan became harry potter for a minute had a go at the quidditch in the green room!
4 hours was not enough for us! We ended the trip with a nice hot chocolate and then we went to Harrods and then I went crazy!
Overall, I'd say we had a good day in London. For this trip, I did quite a lot of pre-trip "lesson" with the kids as I wanted it to be exciting, educational and meaningful for them too. So they left with a bit of background about the countries they will be visiting. I think
Irfan and Alisha are at a good age to be involved in making this trip more meaningful for themselves.
So now, on to another adventure. Irfan and Alisha are excited to take the Eurostar! We will be on route to Amsterdam. Insyallah, may HE keep all of us safe.
Till later, good night!
We started the day early with nice English breakfast. We then had a nice cool walk to the bustop, heading for Victoria. Itinery for the day was to go to Warner bros studio to see Harry Potter studio set! We were super excited! A bus was scheduled to pick us up at Victoria at 11 and bring us to Warner bros. We reached the bus meeting point early and spotted Victoria public library! So we went in and spend some wonderful time in there reading. We love the library:)
Irfan picked out a book about London and we read. Oh how apt! Shahid had time to crawl around and made friends with cute pair of twins! The only downside for the kids was they couldn't borrow any books:(
The Harry potter set was beyond imagination! It was super exciting for me and the kids too!!! To actually walked at the exact location and see how the movie was made was both educational and fascinating for the kids and me. they now know that it's a lot of hard work and ingenuity to produce a film. Irfan became harry potter for a minute had a go at the quidditch in the green room!
4 hours was not enough for us! We ended the trip with a nice hot chocolate and then we went to Harrods and then I went crazy!
Overall, I'd say we had a good day in London. For this trip, I did quite a lot of pre-trip "lesson" with the kids as I wanted it to be exciting, educational and meaningful for them too. So they left with a bit of background about the countries they will be visiting. I think
Irfan and Alisha are at a good age to be involved in making this trip more meaningful for themselves.
So now, on to another adventure. Irfan and Alisha are excited to take the Eurostar! We will be on route to Amsterdam. Insyallah, may HE keep all of us safe.
Till later, good night!
Thursday, June 06, 2013
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