Surrey

A good week for the family...
Sharon graduated on 19th May - after all that hard work - we are so proud of her, and I do so wish we could have seen her walking up Lambton Quay and getting her certificate at the town hall.  But instead we have some wonderful photos and a video which we are very grateful for...

 Mike ran his second marathon last weekend (3 hours 52 seconds) and also featured in the Sydney Financial Review article on graduate recruitment...

It was also the anniversary of our arrival in England 4 years ago - in some ways it seems like yesterday and in other ways a lifetime ago.  We celebrated by going to the ballet Cinderella (Harry's choice not mine).  Great choreography to the music composed by Sergei Prokofiev in the 1940's (he composed Peter and the Wolf and the music to Diana and the Golden Apple - both favourites of mine from the children's Sunday morning radio request show).  On Saturday morning we drove over to Surrey and went for a walk along the top of Box Hill.  A warm sunny day and a pleasant sojourn as we viewed the hills and forests of the local area.  We had parked in a car park which seemed to attract motorcyclists (lots of people our age out for a Saturday ride), walkers and runners.  A place to stop and get out the picnic after a bit of exercise or to buy the greasy food from the cafe - and to sit in the sun and enjoy the spring warmth.  We then stopped at an English vineyard (we haven't seen one over here before), looked at the wine and cafe but it was all closing up for the day so we bought a vegetarian cook book, a present or two, some pink lemonade for us and drove off to find our hotel and a meal.

Sunday we went to Clandon house.  Unfortunately, the weather wasn't that good, blustery, cold and showery and so people sheltered under blankets and trees to watch the London Maori group from Ngati Hinemihi perform songs and the haka.  We'd been to the house before but this time had the opportunity to go inside the little meeting house and to hear the author of the book that we had bought 'The House with the Golden Eye' speak.

 And guess what Peter Dunne's hairstyle reached the papers over here...