The Wandering Davidsons: Day 1 - Arrival and Brighton

We flew out of Sofia. Our flight was at noon, but because Bulgaria is an hour ahead of us and we didn't know how long it would take us to get across the border, we drove up Thursday after Mike got off work. We stayed at the Hilton and ordered Pizza Hut. We were able to sleep in a little the day of our flight, and made it through check in, security, and passport control with plenty of time to spare. We flew on Easy Jet - a no frills airline where you pay for all the extras. Since I was flying with the 3 kids by myself, we paid the fee to be able to board in the first wave. I think half the plane paid for this priviledge. However, we worked it just right so that we were the very first ones on the plane! Aubree and Chris sat in the bulkhead row in the middle and window seats, and Nick and I were a row behind in the middle and aisle. It was nice. The flight was 3 hours and very "boring". Nick slept almost the whole time because he was bored, while Aubree and Chris read and played games. I finally started reading the "Hunger Games". When we landed in Gatwick, we breezed through passport control, picked up our luggage, and found Buzz, Hannah, L'eah (pronounced El-ee-ah), and Xander all waiting for us!!! I got to hold Xander right away! L'eah was SO happy that Nick Bob was there, but was a little miffed that she wasn't coming to Macedonia to see us. We loaded the car up with our luggage to head to the house, and Buzz and L'eah took the train. We got to the flat that Hannah and Buzz share with her dad and got situated a bit, ate some lunch, then headed into town. It was nice to be able to walk almost every place we wanted to go. We saw the sea, bought Nick a lightweight jacket, saw a lot of cool buildings, and the highlight for the kids - ate at Burger King. Ugh. At least it didn't make me sick like it does in the States. It was so much fun wandering and being able to see where Buzz and Hannah have lived the last 7 months. I absolutely LOVED seeing all the cool old houses and buildings and churches that are so OLD. Some are in better condition than others, and almost all have been divided up into multiple flats. It's sad. I'm sure Buzz got sick of hearing me start a sentence with, "Could you imagine living there?!?". After we'd eaten, Hannah and I left the kids with Buzz to go grocery shopping. In a real store. With lots of food. Fruits and vegetables not in season. Real milk that tastes good. I was in HEAVEN!!! We bought tons of different fruits that we ate all week. Han's a bit of a chocoholic, so we also had sweets to eat all week. It was a nice balance.
Also, Flat Stanley came along with us on our trip (I'm glad he's flat and could come in the luggage!) so there are plenty of pictures with him. Here are pictures from our first day!