We ended the working week quite hurriedly having not been particularly organised. What with trying out more vegetarian recipes (leek and potato pie and pumpkin pie) for guests (Chris) during the week who had time for packing? Not me!! We started off early on Friday afternoon in the hope we wouldn't get caught up in summer holiday traffic. No such luck. We joined a queue, quickly reviewed our plans and went past the long snake of cars around the round about and along some A and B through little Cotswolds villages - quite a pleasant option. After finding the hotel without much trouble we went to the nearby restaurant for a roast. Here the chef dished up our dinner and asked "Do you want some seasoning?" as he pointed to stuffing. Not wanting salt and pepper but wanting stuffing we asked for clarification with a confused look and he gave us the explanation in rather a long winded way (we wondered if our dinner was going to get cold while we patiently agreed with him). It seems that the restaurant owners have said customers were not to be asked "Would you like stuffing?" - its impolite and just not pc. Instead seasoning is the new pc term. After discussing this over dinner at length (and some further possibilities for pc to go mad) we drove into Lutterworth (home to Frank Whittle – inventor of the jet engine and John Wycliffe - famous 14th century Methodist) to the supermarket where we bought tomorrows lunch (our new chilly box already coming in handy). Returning to the hotel, thanks to road works we took the long route back - the 'diversion' signs even confounding the locals.
Why not start a holiday with a discussion about the weather!! While sitting in a pub waiting for our dinner at the end of the holiday we were perusing the wine list - this came about not only because we wanted a glass but also when Harry ordered a medium white he was told that he could only have small or large. Anyway, the wine list was quite comprehensive with wines from many countries including NZ, Australia, Chile, Argentina, Spain, France and fairly good descriptions of their taste and effect - quite a good source of adjectives for describing the weather when you get tired of the same old same old...vivacious, lingering, sparkling, robust, powerful, lively, refreshing, energetic, crisp, full of character, generous, full bodied, invigorating, clear, intense, complex and fresh. That pretty much sums up the lack of sunshine.
But it is summer time and that is when hay is reaped. After passing many fields with hay in various states of manufacture we began to wonder if the making of hay in some way reflects the personality of the farmer. You may laugh, but just think about it for a mo - we saw some hay still growing, some cut, some bales (round, square, oblong), some bales randomly left in the fields, some neatly stacked in a pile or distractedly piled into an insecure tower, some wrapped in green plastic, others black and some clear. One farmer had scrimped a bit on the wrapping and each bale had a narrow clear band around the middle making it look like an obese egg timer. Doesn't this reflect the well organised farmer, or the orderly, the risk taker, the trusting one (of the weather forecaster - believe me not a thing to do over here), the procastinator who hasn't yet reaped the golden grass from the land etc etc. It's a pity I couldn't get more photos - but most of the time there wasn't a safe place to stop.
On Saturday morning I woke up early – there is something bizarre about longing for a sleep in on Monday to Friday and then in the weekends not being able to. But there was lots to do - far more exciting than going to work. Grimes Grave is a Neolithic flint mine, which from the top looks a bit like a grassed over moonscape (lots of bumps and dips) and from below (down a 30 step near vertical ladder) is a deep tunnel with lots of little caves where 5000 years ago people hacked and hacked to get the flint out. Harry spent a while lying on the ground taking photos of some rubble and looking a little bit silly – but what the heck he enjoyed it – and then spent all day in very dusty black trousers (I suggested that he walked behind me in his dusty attire and sat at a different table for dinner but that fell on deaf ears!). Anyway, back to the stone age...they dug a hole with antlers and stones, took out all the flint and then covered the mine in and started another not far away. Hence the circular indentations in the local ground. The guide (who incidentally didn't go down the mine with us) was full of historical trivia which had little to do with the workers at Grimes Graves but was sort of interesting all the same...
- Hey Diddle Diddle - Diddle was the farmer. He wanted to buy some land off the monks in the nearby abbey but they didn't want to sell. Diddle decided to send his daughter (cat) to seduce the head of the abbey (cow). The dog gargoyles at the monastery laughed and the daughter (dish) ran away with the spoon (the chef at the monastery whom she was in love with).
- A flash in the pan – if there was not enough gun power in the gun pan then there would not be a big enough flash for the gun to go off in a flint lock gun.
- To go off half cocked - to fire the gun pull firing lever – half way while loading the pan – if you forget to fully cock it then it wouldn’t be enough spark and wouldn’t fire the gun.
True or false - who knows? We lunched in the picnic spot next to the signs that said sheep liked to wander and picnic as well but we didn’t see any thankfully (after our Sugarloaf experience we were quite relieved).
An hour later we were driving through pine forests (the first we have seen in England), an oak tree avenue before arriving at Sandringham – where the Queen and her family spend most of their Christmases. The house was built in 1870 by the Prince and Princess of Wales (later King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra). The house was typically full of memorabilia and ornate, the museum gave us an insight into the royal family over the last few decades – the cars they drove and were driven in – some interesting photos. There was a 1900 Daimler Phaeton, a Merryweather fire engine which sat around waiting for a fire and several mini kid cars that the kids played in. I sat for a while in the sun and noticed an elderly lady worryingly telling staff that she couldn’t find her husband – after a few ‘aren’t you lucky’ comments I realised that she was actually quite concerned. He did eventually turn up. The highlight of the visit was the garden - one of my favourite flowers the hydrangea a surprise contributor. We wandered around the lake and the stream and picnicked in the park. (Now for a blonde moment - obviously hungry I passed one of the shops and asked Harry if he "had ever tried pickled strawberries?" Yes they were selling them according to the board outside and I marched in to buy some only to be followed by Harry telling me the sign said "freshly picked" and not "pickled"). And on to the most exquisite little church that is open during the visitor season but I think closed to the public when the royals come to stay. It has an altar and pulpit in finally engraved silver (someone would have to pay me a lot to keep it clean). There was an aircraft museum on the way to Peterborough and I sat in the car and only managed to read the front page of the newspaper before Harry returned (a record for him – could he be losing interest I wondered? No it was close to closing time). We spent a while driving around Peterborough trying to find the hotel – having taken the right turning off the main road but the wrong road after it (the story of our lives). We went and had a look at the cathedral (from the outside it looked massive – but it was closed) and after sheltering from a passing shower we found a Thai restaurant which we would probably revisit if we ever went back to the city.
"On the road again
Just can't wait to get on the road again
The life I love is making music with my friends
And I can't wait to get on the road again.
On the road again
Goin' places that I've never been
Seein' things that I may never see again
And I can't wait to get on the road again".It was definitely travelling time again. It was only 3 hours to our next stop - through James Herriot country, through the pink Yorkshire moors into Goathland where Heartbeat and parts of some the Harry Potter movies were filmed. We wandered the streets with the tourists and the sheep, past the little garage, railway station, shop and pub.
And onto Whitby - a little English seaside villages - where pedestrians walk on the road because the footpaths are too narrow and parking is a long way from the centre. We crawled through the town and up the hill to
Whitby Abbey which stands on a cliff over looking the harbour. On this Sunday afternoon, we sauntered past the Abbey and down the steep cobbled stone path (having missed the path to the 199 steps), and walked shoulder to shoulder with hundreds of others to Grape Lane where Captain Cook lived as a teenager and dreamt about becoming a captain. It was in this town that his three ships were built (Endeavour, Resolution and Adventure).We circled the port in a 1940’s life boat – and found some fish and chips to eat on the wharf (not plagued by sea gulls). One of the books I have of walking in England told us a little of the history of this town:
- · In Church Street in the 1600’s alum was manufactured. One of the important ingredients for processing alum is alkaline which helps to keep the colours fast. A very good place to find alkaline is in one's urine. So people saved it up and sold it - better than throwing it on the streets I guess. Huge vats of it were stored in this street – it is from this that the saying ‘take the piss’ comes from - and I gather the street didn't smell too aromatic during that century.
- · The black stone known as jet is local to this area and comes from the fossilised remains of the monkey puzzle tree.
The next morning was spent in Newcastle - we have wanted to go there for a long time as Harry's Grandmother lived here in West Moreland Road. We think it was from here that the family left for Kiwiland. Like all our Grandparents English homes this one no longer existed but we walked up and down the street wondering if it was now a disused car yard or perhaps part of the Newcastle College. We wandered past the museum now housed in one of the oldest buildings in the street to get a feel for those bygone years and helpful librarians in Archives found us a photo of the corner of a house in the same street back in the late 1800's. There was a photo of 'blind back' houses - no back windows and backing on to an industrial waste heap. Walking back to the hotel along the river we found 5 bridges in less than a kilometre – the place was a full of bird poop and so we walked hurriedly along until I saw a board which talked about the nesting of the kittiwakes – not the normal sea gull scavengers - they spend most of their life out at sea and when they come ashore they like to nest under the bridges. The downpour arrived just as we finished our walk – not bad timing as others rushed for cover. We drove to Alnwick and it hadn't stopped raining so we sat in the car park and had lunch, not quite managing to summon the energy to walk in torrential rain through the garden and around the castle (which from a leaflet looked quite worth a visit). This is where one of Harry’s NZ workmates was born and the next stop Berwick on Tweed was where the workmate worked for a while before immigrating to NZ. Walked for a bit on the beach enjoying the salt and seaweed smell (no joke) we walked through the town and around a bit of the wall that is left and headed towards Lindisfarne in the hope that we had timed the low tide for our visit - no such luck and not surprising since we had not planned to visit the island which an only be accessed during low tide. After this it was on to Kilmarnock where we threw our bags in the hotel room and went for dinner – being a Monday night we weren’t hopeful of getting much. But there was a local pub down the road which sold fairly good food and had a quiz on which we joined in on (we have decided not to call ourselves the Kiwis anymore – as coming last is not a good image – it is the Wallabies from now on). The staff were great and after the quiz they must have felt sorry for us cos they came up to chat and to tell us a few places we could go and see – so that is tomorrow – all ready organised – thankfully not a lot of car riding tomorrow – I have had enough for a day or so. It was probably about now that Cheryl my sister left a message on our cell phone to say Mum was going down hill. We didn't get the message for some reason, but even without that message a shadow was over our holiday knowing that someone we care about is not well.
