Nearly away...

Three more sleeps to go until we get on that plane and head for Istanbul! Suitcase is fairly packed (few bulges to re-place) and passports ready! What else do we need?
So the plan is Istanbul for a week - exploring and sight seeing. Then to Athens for a week, with an overnight trip to Delphi and a day sailing. After this we head to Santorini for three nights - have organised a wee rental car and hope to see some beautiful sunsets! After this we head to Cairo for six days - a pyramid trip is essential and hopefully some Nile cruising.
Will be working hard to relax - it's just been announced here that school will now not start back until Ramadan - nearly 4 weeks after it originally was meant to! However we don't get longer holidays - so will have induction and lots of work meetings. Then we have to try and fit into 9 weeks what we had planned for 12 - not as easy as it sounds when there's end of semester exams! Anyway these things happen and there's nothing we can do about it. However we are hoping to get a week in Nov - when we'll head to Japan to see Liz and the crew, then 2-3 weeks in late Dec - and yes we'll come home to NZ!
So most of the crew here have left! Kalala and family have gone to France and then UK. Most kiwis have gone home. I'm glad I didn't go earlier - I spent all Friday sleeping and then a very lazy day yesterday. today we've been at the National Identitiy office - getting ID cards. I was the first woman (we lined up at 7am) but Brent was the 21st man. So I finished at 8.30 am and he's still in there - 10.14 am! Hopefully he's not far away now. The rest of today and tomorrow will do some work and then relax on Tuesday and make sure we really DO have everything.
The hardest part about this time of the year is saying goodbye to people who are not coming back this year. Kate, an Irish friend, is going home - this has been a hard year for her with a family bereavement - so she's going to spend time with her family and look at options closer to home. Will miss her bubbliness but a good taster of what may happen next year in larger numbers. At this stage will stay for a few more years but some people just want to save a bit of money and head off on their next adventure - which I totally get.
Will try and blog while away - if not will make up for it when we get back in early August.
Take care everyone. :0)