Anything that can go wrong...

We knew it was coming, but that didn't really make it any easier to hear...

I had called before we left in February to switch our insurance policy from homeowner to a landlord policy since we would be having people renting our house while we were gone. Then I get an email about 6 weeks ago saying that they came out to inspect the house for the policy change and there were repairs needing to be done. It took forever emailing back and forth to figure out exactly what they were wanting repaired, but in the end, they wanted a new roof. We knew the house needed a new roof, but we ran out of time before we left to do anything about it hoping it could just wait until we came back. No such luck...insurance said it had to be replaced.

My brother found someone that could do it at a pretty good rate and fairly quick. Unfortunately while they were replacing it, they found that when it was put on before, they had done a pretty shoddy job (they used cardboard as shims!). Fixing the previous bad workmanship ended up costing us an extra $1000...ouch. But hey, at least now we have a nice new roof, right?

So then last week, I call my brother to see how the roof is coming along, and he asks "did you get my email?". I asked if it was the one about the roof and my stomach sank at his reply, "no, the a/c is out". This was yet another repair that we were dreading and really, really hoping wouldn't have to be done before we came back. It is supposed to be replaced today.

I think the only good thing, is that at least our house will be pretty much ready to sell, if we want to list it when we get back. It should be good to be able to tell people that it has a brand new roof and a/c, right?

Some people already know about our plane ticket woes as well, but for those that don't...it is really expensive to change return tickets. When we first booked our flights, we weren't sure how long we would be able to stay, so we just booked them to stay for 3 months. We knew we would have to pay the change fees to get the return dates changed but it still seemed like our best bet. It looked like it would end up costing around $1500 to change the tickets to a later date if we decided to stay. Well our return flight was on May 15th, so a few weeks before, we called to see about cancelling the flight and getting credit for our return. Guess how much it would cost for us to change the date to later in the year? $3000!! We could just about book one way flights back cheaper than we could change our existing tickets. When we got this news, we had a decision to make: A) go back on the 15th, B)pay up to change the flights or C)try to figure something else out. None of us were really ready to go back...we were already on our way to Bulgaria which meant we wouldn't even have a chance to go to Ireland (the one place Evan has been wanting to go), and Carter's dad was already planning to come meet us in mid-May. However, we also didn't want to blow $3000 on our flight home. At that point, we just decided that we weren't going to go home yet. We would look for a better/cheaper option, but if nothing came up, we would just have to spend the money.

Now, a month later, we have our return trip booked. It's more than we intended to spend, but a good bit cheaper than changing our return tickets. We're taking a transatlantic cruise instead! Who would have thought that a 14 day cruise would be cheaper than a one way flight? We will leave from Copenhagen on September 30th and arrive in Miami on October 14th. What better way to end a long trip, huh?

Now we've got 4 months or so to figure out what we are going to do when we get back.

West Linton

So where is West Linton anyway? You probably have never heard of it, as we hadn’t before we came, but it’s just a little outside of Edinburgh. It took about an hour by bus, but half that time is just getting out of Edinburgh (it also didn’t help that the bus started overheating on the way and the driver had to stop by a spring on the side of the road to add a bunch of water).

We’ve been here about a week now, and it really is a nice little town.  Apparently we got here at just the right time too because there's a big festival just started this weekend. Yesterday they had the big “ride out”  where about 30 people on horseback went out and rode all around the borders and then returned to the crowds cheers as they splashed through the river that runs through the town.

The kids had fun ridding some carnival rides, and Evan especially enjoyed her pony ride.

And what is a country fair without some nice tractors on display?? 

The couple we are staying with have a little girl, Iona, who is 3.5, so they have all been playing together. I don’t think the kids knew what to do with themselves being surrounded by so many toys.

Evan wasted no time getting into the dress-up box...

Evan's heart shaped pizza that she made

Our Holiday

So we didn’t really have anything planned out, so the whole thing was just done sort of where we felt like going that day. We ended up staying the first 3 nights or so in Edinburgh, toured the castle, saw a museum, walked around a good bit. Then we rented a car and headed up to Inverness. We took the long way and stopped in St Andrews for Carter and his Dad to visit the golf course there. The kids enjoyed walking on the beach collecting shells.  I had to take a bit of sand with me…it was the softest, most powdery sand I’d ever felt (full of crushed shells).

 view from Edinburgh Castle

 at the National Museum

 gotta love the look on Elliot's face

 outside the club house at St Andrews

 Notice the stark difference in Elliot's attire and the boys behind him?

It had been 2 months since they had bathed in a "normal" bath tub and this hotel had a huge one for them to enjoy.

Inverness was nice and we visited Loch Ness while we were there…Carter showed me where he camped on the beach there back in 2000. No, we didn’t see Nessie. We took some wonderful scenic drives around the highlands and took some wonderful pictures.  We spent a few nights there and then headed on back to Edinburgh.

Pictures around Loch Ness...

If you’re ever in Edinburgh, there’s a great little hostel called Haggis Hostel where the people were super friendly. Evan and Elliot made quick friends with one of the owners there and were following him around everywhere. By the time we left, the wall of their office was covered in drawings that Evan had made for them. He also turned Evan into a Hearts fan (local football club) which didn’t take much convincing…I mean they’re called the Hearts- how could she not like them?

We then continued on over to Glasgow for a couple of nights and took a little walking tour around the city. And we ventured over to Stirling for one night before heading back to Edinburgh for Jim to catch his train back to London and for us to catch a bus to West Linton. The whole thing was a bit of whirlwind, but we saw some great sites and enjoyed our visit.

Here are some random pics from our drive around the Highlands...I'm not sure on locations.

Goodbye country, hello big city

We had a great last day in Bulgaria...to start off, Lisa came by the house to pick Evan up for a little riding lesson.

Elliot got a quick turn as well...

Then we headed over to the S’s house…another English couple that live in a nearby village and have a little boy about Elliot’s age named Sebastien. The kids had a great time and we had a good time chatting as well. 

After hanging out at their house for the afternoon and seeing the work they’ve done on their house, we stopped by a neat little café with a playground…how perfect is that?

Then we headed back to Lisa and Ewen's where Evan showed off her favorite pastime...

Lisa felt sorry for us not getting much meat while we were there (we weren’t going hungry and had plenty of good food), so she had gotten some meat mince and made a wonderful meat pie with potatoes on top – yum! We had a great time and really hated for the evening to come to an end. It doesn’t really seem to be getting any easier to say goodbye. We all really enjoyed ourselves there, and I think the only thing that kept Evan from getting too upset about going was that we were on our way to see Papaw.  I think she hugged and said goodbye to everyone several times that night.

We left Osikovo and took the 7 hour train back to Plovdiv where we caught our flight to Frankfurt…I mean Frankfurt-Hahn. This one little typo can make a big difference. When I was booking our flights and when I had to book a hotel at the last minute because we had no other place to stay for our layover, I didn’t realize that Frankfurt-Hahn airport wasn’t actually in, or even near really, Frankfurt City. So there we were in Hahn which is actually about 100km from Frankfurt with a useless hotel reservation that we had already paid for and couldn’t use.  Of course we didn’t even figure this out until after we spent the night at the airport (hotels aren’t cheap and we got in really late anyway, so we decided to save a bit and spend one of the 2 nights at the airport).  Once we figured out the Frankfurt issue, we had to find another place to stay. So we walked right across the street and got a room (cheaper than the one we paid for in Frankfurt). Oh well…live and learn, right?

 Anyway, we finally made it to Edinburgh! And luckily didn’t have any trouble meeting up with Carter’s Dad there. It was nice to have electricity, running water, a shower, etc…but you also have to deal with all the people! I think it was the first time in my life I’ve ever experienced anything close to culture shock. Going from the tiny village in Bulgaria to a big city like Edinburgh was a massive change, and I must say, I found myself often missing the country life. We saw lots of interesting buildings, castles, museums, etc…but the streets were just so congested. It made me miss being somewhere where everyone has time to stop for a chat.