Well, Brian and I survived the long journey home, and so did our luggage. There it all was on the carousel – usually at least one bag goes astray, but not this time. Good news! On a recent trip to Mexico my bag finally arrived a week later, after the airline denied any knowledge of it. And then there was the time I was meeting Brian in Paris where he was attending a meeting, and my bag went missing. Horrors – no change of clothes. Luckily our hotel was next to some really, really nice shops. What’s a girl to do when faced with such a situation?

Once the bags had all arrived we placed them on to 2 very overloaded trolleys, and headed through customs. The customs man had a lot of questions for us, but clearly wasn’t interested in my reciting the details of all of our shopping, and he finally just waved us through.

Our wonderful vacation was over, and on Thursday morning after removing all of the mice bait from my engine (mice ate through the wiring in my engine on a previous trip. My mechanic had never seen such damage before), my trusty little car sprang into action, and I was on my way to work once more. All I could think about on my drive in was food. I was worried that I may be jetlagged and spaced out at work, but that was not the problem. I was constantly hungry. Alas I will have to adjust back to 3 meals a day, and no more tea in the Queens Room. No one placed a chocolate on my pillow last night ☹.

Whilst I was working on craft projects and perfecting my tan at the Lido pool, Brian was hard at work. He successfully managed to convert my blog from last year’s cruise into a book that was published on Amazon, (www.amazon.com/dp/1717066100/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1525038176&sr=8-1&keywords=across+the+world+in+80+days). Yay for self-publishing. I am so excited about it! That makes the return to reality that much easier.

This really has been a wonderful journey. I have learned so much from the places we visited, and the people we were lucky enough to meet along the way. I am constantly amazed by how fortunate those of us are who can explore the world, and have these wonderful memories to light up the darkest of days.