Four months ago we returned from South East Asia, craving for cold weather and heavy duvets. And it was great. On our first day back in London Tim & I went for a walk by the river in Putney and positively purred in the chilly wind. We’d been away for over 6 months, seen fantastic places and done amazing things and it had got to a point where we both felt it was time to come back, to figure out what to do next. Besides, we’d pretty well run out of cash so returning to work really was the only option. We felt that staying in London for the next six months at least would be sensible as we would both be able to get decent jobs and some stability; time to assess what we want to do next and not rush into things.

But then, sensible schmensible. After a couple of months with the National Health Service gaining fascinating insights into the public sector, being genuinely impressed and occasionally very scared by the senior clinicians with whom I worked, I was offered a great job in my own field. It was an overseas posting based in Slovenia to where we’d never been and of which we knew literally nothing; all my work has been much further east in Europe and the Julian Alps haven’t been interesting (high/unpredictable/lethal) enough for Tim to pay a snowboarding/mountaineering visit. So here we are. Or I am anyway, Tim will follow in a couple of weeks’ time after finishing his notice period. ‘But what will he DO?’ you ask as does everyone else. I reckon he’ll spend the first week sorting out the flat (I haven’t been able to tell where the fuse boxes and tweaky knobs to do with electricity and the sort are) and re-arranging the layout simply because he can. Then he’ll probably spend the autumn exploring the mountains and generally getting muddy. Finally, in December he’ll marry me. I’d call that a busy schedule and not an unpleasant one either.

Ljubljana is growing on me. I knew it was going to be a small capital (300,000 people; the total population of Slovenia is 2m) and was looking forward to this image of Tirana or Prishtina…lots of people doing lots of things very noisily, chaotic traffic, dust, tremendous energy (people), power cuts (electricity), grey apartment blocks, the warmest hospitality…that buzz that has a curious nature of being exhilarating and hair raisingly frustrating at the same time. But no. Ljubljana does not do chaos. Ljubljana is very pretty and pristine. There is no rubbish on the streets. People wait for the green man at the traffic lights even though there is never any traffic. The town architecure boasts grand Baroque style. I mean, people have pedigree pet dogs and they poop scoop! The place looks like a provincial Austrian town, not like a capital of a former Yugoslav republic! Damn. Still, my team has the spirit that doesn’t stop for traffic lights or entertain pretence of any kind and I feel deeply familiar and comfortable with it.

We decided to start this blog again as so many of you kept in touch with us through our website while we were travelling, and it has been brilliant to be able to keep that record. There are some problems with the comment section at the moment, nothing can currently be posted, but hopefully that’ll be fixed soon.