Egypt

At 4 am this morning Paul and I arrived back from a week in Egypt, staying at a glorious hotel in Sharm El Sheikh, by the Red Sea. We dithered for ages about going away, wondering if it was worth the money, and decided only about a month ago that it was, that unless we went away we wouldn't switch off from the world and relax, have some time to invest in us.

So with this, and some guaranteed sunshine, as our goal, we booked into an all inclusive hotel, for a reasonable amount of money, but encouraged that we weren't being too extravagant by Val and Ivor, who had a lovely holiday in Scotland for about the same amount of money (they had 2 weeks but were camping)

Apart from a very cramped, noisy flight we had a fantastic time. The weather was wall to wall sunshine, daytimes of 34C, dropping to maybe 28C overnight. Every day beautiful blue skies, spent lazing by the pool, or the beach, reading, listening to music or talks, or just chilling, swimming, or in Paul's case snorkelling.

Evenings started with a glass (or two) or champagne (ok Paul - the heathen - drank beer) followed by a lovely meal, then sitting out on the terrace, chatting over a glass (or two - do you see a pattern!!) of brandy - putting the world to rights or planning future holidays ( that safari we've been talking about for ages, a villa in Italy with kids and whatever co they have), talking of friends, family, life.

Decent sleep in a lovely room with aircon and blackout curtains and a seaview.

Lovely people, nothing too much trouble, who remember what you like to drink......

I'll gloss over the evening wasted by the stomach bug, even though I was very very careful.......

Paul had an amazing trip up Mount Sinai but wrecked his feet with blisters and aching muscles, I had a lovely manicure...I do feel a little guilty that I didn't venture outside the resort but maybe next time. This time was for chilling.

And I feel rested, and that our marriage has benefited from this investment, we, Paul in particular, have been very busy, and he flies to New York for nearly 2 weeks tomorrow, and this is how we chose to live but its important to give 'us' time too.

And of course I missed home, and the kids, who coped amazingly without us, and I'm glad to be home, and whilst I'd rather have another week off, I'm happy to go back to work tomorrow. This time last year it was very different.

So I have much to be very grateful for. Photos to follow..