We're back

Singapore

Youth Olympic Games Mascots welcoming party at Changi Airport

We've spent the last few days trying to get over our jet lag. Which means we haven't really been in the mood to shop.

Besides, being on a tropical island means the humidity drives you nuts as soon as you step outside. And the kids aren't fans of how the place smells (imagine a Chinese/Japanese/Indian restaurant surrounding you 24/7) - it's not exactly offensive, but its easy to get tired of being bombarded.

We did make ourselves get up for a tour of the city and a visit to the zoo for breakfast, though.

Singapore's Merlion - the city's mascot

Thian Hock Keng Temple

Breakfast at the Zoo

And we couldn't leave without having one of these...

A Singapore Sling each on our last night

Right now we're at the airport waiting to board our plane to Sydney. And yes, we're all totally ready to come home.

Malmö

Malmö is just over the Öresund Bridge from Copenhagen and home to the newest member of our family.

Hanging out with Uncle Nick and baby Viggo

Wandering through parks in Malmö

We happened to hit town just as the Malmö Festival kicked off, so we spent a couple of days exploring the city and eating a lot of excellent Swedish food.

Crayfish party - hand-made silly hats a must

Before...

After...

We also spent a day exploring Copenhagen, where we took a canal boat tour. It was good until we got rained on. And then we found out the Chinese have borrowed one of the star attractions.

Here's the spot where the Littlest Mermaid usually is - her place now features a sign telling people to visit www.mermaidexchange.com

Tomorrow we leave for Singapore, where we'll stay for a few days before finally heading home.

Skopje/Budapest/Copenhagen/Malmö

A long delay at Skopje airport last Friday afternoon meant that we spent most of our trip north playing catch-up and hoping that our connecting flight in Budapest would wait for us. 

Lucky it did and the rest of the trip went smoothly. We got to Malmö only an hour later than expected. And we had a really cute baby waiting to meet us at the end.

Hello Viggo!!

Macedonia :: Week 6

We spent our final week in Macedonia fitting in last-minute visits with people we still hadn't caught up with/saying goodbye to everyone. And packing - luggage count has officially risen to include two more full-size suitcases.

We also visited one last archaeological site, Heraclea.

And we got to meet a real live stork - one of Sash's cousins found a it by the roadside and thought it would be a good idea to bring it home.

Macedonia :: Week 5

This week we visited the village Sash's mum grew up in and went looking for her old house. Found it and one of Sash's uncles hanging out at his weekender.

House in Sekirani

Catching up with Uncle Boris

On the way home, we also found Sash's great uncle (his grandmother's brother) walking along the main road purely by chance.

Dedo Goce

We spent the rest of the week doing the village thing in Gabalavci - basically lots of eating, drinking and sitting around.

Helping with the farmwork... sorting tobacco leaves ready for threading and drying.

Hangin' with the boys outside the village shop

And (FINALLY), a tractor ride

Next week we get to tidy up the unit, sort our stuff and start packing before we head off to Sweden.

Macedonia :: Week 4

August 2nd is THE patriotic national holiday in Macedonia - it marks the anniversary of a day of organised revolt against the Ottoman empire over a century ago. The biggest gathering happens in a place called Krushevo - even the president rocks up for a meet and greet and to give a speech. Guess who got to shake his hand this year?

Crowd gathering...

Waiting for his moment with the president (sorry, the handshake was only sort-of captured on video)

Mechkin Kamen (Bear Rock) monument at Krushevo

We left for a driving tour of the northern part of Greece the next day. The region we drove through was part of Macedonia until just under 100 years ago - even though so much time has passed, everyone who is Macedonian still refers to all of the major towns and cities by their old Macedonian names.

A lot of significant archaeological sites have been found in the region dating back to the time of Alexander the Great. So we split our time between beaches and "old stuff".

We knew the area would be relatively flat compared to what we'd been around over the past few weeks, but it was still a surprise to see everything disappearing into haze everywhere we looked.

On the road

Plains around Vergina

One of the best finds was the waterfall on Mt Olymp.

On the way up

Freshwater pool too hard to resist...

We stayed at a resort in a place called Kallithea, right on the Aegean. Hot days + warm water + shallows you can wade out into for hundreds of metres + pool when you get tired of the beach = awesome.

On the way home we drove through a place that used to be called Voden (now Edessa) where we found another waterfall. Only this is one you can actually walk behind.

Next week we'll be visiting Sash's mum's village and some other places close to Bitola.

Macedonia :: Week 3

After leaving Ohrid we met my parents (and a bunch of my relatives) in Kumanovo, and the day after we went to the small village where my dad was born – a place called German, way up a mountain near the Serbian border.

We spent the weekend wandering around what used to be the farmland my dad’s family lived off as well as being bitten/stung by a fascinating variety of bugs and plants. And we got to use (several) traditional hole-in-the-ground toilets while we were there. So didn't need that.

The old house my dad was raised in had fallen down years ago - dad's family have rebuilt it on exactly the same spot.

The out-house attached to the old grain store

The mountains behind the horses are part of Serbia

Sunset over the mountains

Then we left for Skopje, where we spent a couple of days doing all of the important capital city tourist things like visiting all the right monuments, monasteries and restaurants (and lots more of my family).

Kamen Most (Stone Bridge)

Goce Delcev monument

One of the best places we visited was Lake Matka, which was artificially created in a canyon just outside Skopje.

The boat trip up the canyon included entry to one of the illuminiated caves. We also go to see the entrance to Vrelo Cave. 

Then on the way back to Bitola we visited one of Macedonia’s most important archaeological sites – Stobi.

A couple of days later it was time to visit the village where mum was born and raised – a placed called Capari, not far from Bitola. The kids couldn’t get enough of picking and eating fruit straight from the trees growing along roads and branches hanging over fences.

Wandering livestock - Maksim thought it was funny when this calf rocked up to the centre of the village for a drink

House where my mum was born

Mum found her old clay water bottle (barde) in the basement - we washed it off so we could get a good picture of it.

Tomorrow we’re off to Krushevo for a very important event. After that Sash gets to try his hand at driving a manual car on the wrong side of the road as we head off to visit the Aegean Sea.