The White Cliffs of Dover and Hever Castle
We’re now in our 6th week of working from home and the most I’ve gone out has been a few jogs earlier this week –… Read More »The White Cliffs of Dover and Hever Castle
Personal
India Diaries 2019
The events in this post took place nearly four months ago. It’s been over four weeks of quarantine and I think most of the days… Read More »India Diaries 2019
Happy New Year 2020!
If you were born in the 80s, raised in the 90s and made it to 2020: You have lived in 4 different decades, 2 different… Read More »Happy New Year 2020!
Journey to the Isle of Wight
We’ve typically taken a holiday in September but due to several different reasons, Ashwina and I decided to book the first week of October for… Read More »Journey to the Isle of Wight
Exploring Bath and Stonehenge
The last weekend was a long one cause of Easter and we’ve typically not done much on the Easter Monday bank holiday. However, Seema and Rodney, who were in London and bunking with us, had already booked tickets to visit Bath and Stonehenge. So, Ashwina and I also tagged along.
We arrived at Victoria before 8am well ahead of our scheduled departure. It allowed us to get some decent seats in the middle of the bus. We set out towards Bath first which is about 2.5 hours away from London. We luckily didn’t encounter much traffic given the early start.
Bath
We reached Bath around 11am on a relatively bright and shiny day. Our ticket did not include the entry into the Roman Baths as we weren’t convinced it was worth the cost.
However, we did visit Bath Abbey. The foundation of the abbey dates back to the 7th century. We didn’t spend a lot of time there as it is relatively small and parts of it under restoration.
Living in a Lighthouse – Part II
When it rains… look for Rainbows When it’s dark… look for Stars If there is a Part I, there has to be at least a… Read More »Living in a Lighthouse – Part II
Living in a Lighthouse – Part I
It isn’t often that one gets to live in a lighthouse. Ashwina wanted to find out what it feels like to live in one. So,… Read More »Living in a Lighthouse – Part I
From Mumbai to Pune
After a week in Mumbai, Ashwina and I set off to Pune to spend time at her place with her Mom and Dad.
I like going to Pune because, unlike Mumbai, I get to spend a lot of time resting and relaxing. As expected, this holiday also delivered the same. I even had time to work on my WordPress plugins as well as catch up on office work.
Purchasing a car
Ashwina planned to buy a car in Pune for her parents to replace a very old Maruti Suzuki Alto. She had shortlisted the Maruti Suzuki Ignis and we had the vendor send us a test drive vehicle on Friday.
We decided to go ahead with the Ignis and paid the booking amount on Saturday followed by the rest of it on Monday. The car was ready to be collected promptly on Thursday morning.
Saturday night live
We met Saby on Saturday evening for dinner and drinks. Dinner was at The Sassy Spoon in Koregaon Park.
The Sassy Spoon turned out to be a bright and rather alive place with a good atmosphere and music. I had a rather funky pani puri martini which is essentially the pani puri masala water with a kick. We also had chicken and prawns for starters and I dug into Ashwina’s Goan sausage mac and cheese for mains. In short, we really enjoyed the food and drink at The Sassy Spoon.
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Holiday in Mumbai
Ashwina and I embarked on our annual visit to Mumbai and Pune on Feb 1. In 2018, we visited India in March. However, this year we decided to stick to our Feb schedule.
To Mumbai
We booked ourselves on premium economy with British Airways as this was the best deal we could find. Unfortunately, as I did the bookings in October, we couldn’t take advantage of the reward flights and the Amex BA voucher. Speaking about reward flights, I feel that British Airways has gotten quite miserly about them!
I’ve always loved Heathrow Terminal 5 and we took advantage of my status to use the First check-in and security which opens up directly into the lounge! We got some food into our bellies before heading out to do some shopping at the Duty Free.
The flight was definitely one of the most uncomfortable ones I’ve been on. BA used an older plane on this flight which meant even the premium economy felt like economy. The food wasn’t very great either!
We landed in Mumbai after a painful overnight flight to bright sunshine and a relatively empty airport. As a result, we went through immigration swiftly and waited a bit for our baggage before taking a taxi home.
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Happy New Year 2019!
Sitting here on the final day of 2018, I’d like to wish all my regular and irregular readers a Happy New Year 2019. Keeping with my long tradition, here’s my life in review post for 2018. Do you agree with Dilbert’s view on resolutions? I know I’ve barely kept mine from last year.
Work
Work takes up a significant portion of our lives, mine included. 2018 was a long year for me at work including a tonne of projects, long hours and quite a bit of travel.
Life
2018 involved quite a bit of travelling for Ashwina and me.
India
We started the year with our annual trip to India. India was slightly different this time around. Since both Dad and Arun were in town, Ashwina and I booked a long stay at the ITC Maratha in Mumbai. Our stay turned out to be fabulous with excellent service, good food and we both got lovely gifts from the hospitality team there.
After Mumbai, we headed off to Mangalore. The first time for me after over 30 years! We toured quite a bit especially visiting a few churches.
Pune followed Mangalore where I managed to get some rest. We also met with Rhea for dinner on one day and Saby on another.
We headed back to Mumbai for a day and then returned to London getting Mom back with us for a few months.
