Hi folks,

Sorry for the lack of updates but Internet access has been quite unavailable the last couple of weeks. Ireland was very nice, and we had a lot of fun driving around the country in our decent rental car, however I think all this traveling has just about taken it's toll on us. Its a good thing that in about 2 hours we'll be heading off to Bali for some much needed beach sitting.

We'll be in Bali for about 2 days and 2 nights which is not nearly enough time really, but enough to get in some major shopping in a country where our dollar is actually worth something. We leave Bali for Melbourne on the 31st of December at about 10:20pm so it looks as though we'll be seeing in the New Year at about 50,000 feet. I wonder if they'll do anything special on the plane...

Right now we are in Gatwick airport in Londinium and its 12:45pm. We were in such a mad rush to get here from Ireland that we arrived a bit earlier than expected and now find ourselves with a few hours to kill. It's a good thing that the shopping centre here is quite large. The security here is quite tight at the moment after that chap got sprung with his Jolly Joggers full of C4. There are quite a few police wandering the halls with semi-automatic rifles. It's all a bit scary.

My relatives in Northern Ireland were quite hospitable, and in some respects over hospitable, especially ove Christmas where they were constantly trying to get us drunk... I dont think the realise that we only drink our beer by the pot and not the pint, but still I was able to keep up.

This Internet access is costing me 12p a minute, or about £7.20 per hour. Convert that into the shitful Australian dollar and we're looking at about $20 an hour. They have free ISP sign-up CD's on offer, so I've stuffed about 17 of them into my jacket to try and get my moneys worth.

Gracie's off reading one of the bajillion UK celebrity paparazzi magazines as I type, so I think I'd better get offline before I have to get a bank loan to pay for my Internet Cafe bill.

We both hope you've had the best time over Christmas. Our deepest sympathy if any of you were affected by the recent bushfires. It was quite a huge story over here. Finally, Happy New Year to you all, and we wish you all the best for 2002.

For the last 7 days we've seen pretty much all Britain has to offer. We've gone straight up the right hand side of Britain, up as far north as Glasgow and Edinburgh in Scotland (where I could quite often be heard muttering "SEE YOU JIMMY!" and "That's NOT how you make porridge!") and then down the left hand side through Wales ("Oooer missus!" and "You're a wizard, 'arry!") stopping of at Stonehenge on the way back for a spot of pagan ritualistic dancing about (not nekkid dancing unfortunately... the -6 degree temperatures saw to that).

The other travelers on our tour were all-right sort of folk, including a chick who kinda sorta looked like Buffy and an old dude who kinda sorta looked like Charles "Bud" Tingwell, 'cept there was this quite daft old woman who seemed intent on pissing Gracie off.

We just arrived back in London a few hours ago and after a nap, it's now time for some dinner. Our plane leaves for <> tomorrow at about 1:30pm so we have to be ready for our transfer at about 9:30am, so thats a nice sleep in as opposed to the 6:15am wake-up calls we've been getting over the last week. We'll pick up our cheap rented car at the Belfast airport tomorrow afternoon and head off on our Irish adventure. We'll keep you posted.

Oh, and as some of you know, I'm available via SMS if you've got my number.

Luv Mikey and Gracie.

... The wedding went wonderfully. Weather was perfect, and things went reletivly hitch-free (except for the one hitch that mattered :)

Thanks to everyone who attended the ceremony. I think you'll agree that it really was a nice wedding. I'll try to get a VCD made for anyone who wants one when I get back.

In the meantime, suffer in your jocks. I'm in London and you're not.

With love,

Michael & Gracie McCorry

Here I am in a little Internet Cafe around the corner from our hotel near Hyde Park in London. Yesterday we did a quick round of sight-seeing on a double-decker bus finishing up at Maddam Tassaud's Wax Museum and Planetarium, which was way cool. Today we're hoping to get to The London Dungeon and the Tower of London. Our 7-day British Vista tour of Britain begins early tomorrow morning. Must fly now... gotta catch the tube...