2014
The year started slowly travel wise, with my efforts and finances channeled into arranging my 49th Birthday Party at Exeter City FC and visiting Wembley to watch my Manchester City lift the Capital One Cup.
City were to give me my first travel experience of the year however, when I took Mrs. Wilbur to Barcelona. She enjoyed a spa pampering whilst I took in the game at the Camp Nou Stadium.
For the rest of our three day trip, we re-lived our 2000 honeymoon. For the first time, we took the open top bus tour to get a different perspective on all the sights we had seen previously on foot. Barca never fails to deliver, even providing beautiful March sunshine on this occasion.
Port Olimpic
Antoni Gaudí’s Casa Batlló
Several trips followed to Devon to see family & friends, plus a few to Manchester to see City eventually crowned Premier League Champions.
June saw our wonderful trip to France taking in Provence, Lyon, Alsace & Champagne, the subject of previous posts on this blog.
July & August was spent at home, but I did manage to take in the London stage of the Tour de France – after waiting for 90 minutes in the rain it was a case of blink and you miss it! See my video on Wilbur’s Travels Facebook page.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Wilburs-Travels/552600434874643?ref=bookmarks
September saw Mrs. Wilbur, our pet dog Oli and I join a group of friends for a sponsored walk from Dover to Folkestone.
September then culminated with one of my ‘boys trips’ with my regular travel buddy Hamish, full descriptions of which will appear in my forthcoming book.
It started with an overnight train from Istanbul via Ankara to Erzurum in Eastern Turkey.
Mausoleum of Kemal Atatürk in Ankara
Rail Journey East
From there we took a bus and taxi to the Georgian border and walked across it, rucksacks in tow, at midnight.
A one night stop in Batumi, and it was time for another overnight train to Yerevan, arriving there on the day of their Independence Day celebrations.
The Stage Is Set For A Yerevan Party
We finally reversed part of that train journey back to Tbilisi for a few days, before returning home from our ten-day extravaganza.
View From Tbilisi Fort
November saw the wonderful poppy installation at the Tower of London and a trip to see friends in Athens (see my posts on the Acropolis Museum).
Plenty of pre-Christmas time in London, a wonderful time of the year to be in the capital, as I hunted down Paddingtons and took in the marvellous lights and decorations.
The travel year finished unexpectedly in Lisbon & Devon. Lisbon is a city and a people who will now forever hold a very special place in the hearts of my family and I.
SAO DOMINGOS CHURCH
2015
The year will start with what now promises to be a very spiritual trip to Iceland in search of the Northern Lights. If things go to plan, I will be seeing them on the night of my 50th birthday.
We have a twenty-four hour Eurostar trip to Paris booked for Mrs. Wilbur’s birthday later in January, another trip to France planned for June to stay with a friend at his house in Normandy and are hoping for an October/November adventure to Cambodia & Laos.
Happy wandering.
Wilbur
