For the past two weeks we have been staying with Ol’s aunt and uncle in Suffolk. Staying with three, then two, cats, as, unfortunately, one of them had a mishap on the road, 11 chickens, then 10, as one passed on due to natural causes (we did not eat her), two horses, and a puppy called Thomas who looks like an English Sheepdog, but is in fact a Bearded Collie. We have entered the true English countryside; the area can hardly even be described as a village. There are lots of wild Trevors bouncing around, I have been blackberry picking and eating, Ol helped build a new ‘apartment block’ for the hens, and we have been on the odd country walk. Ol’s uncle is a potter so we got to have a go on the potter’s wheel and create our own clay masterpieces. Actually, they were not as terrible as we imagined – not as bad as they usually turn out on the Generation Game.
Ol’s aunt and uncle have taken us out to Lavenham, a 300 year old village where all the houses have exposed wood beams and lean on odd angles as if they are about to collapse. We went to the beach at Felixstowe, though we have not been swimming as the weather in this country is terrible. The dark brown water and pebbly beach did not add to its appeal.
Then Ol’s cousin took us out to Framlingham Castle. A ruined castle where you can walk along the top, which we did. We also walked around the castle’s moat, but because it does not stop raining in England, it became a bit of an adventure course. There is a certain adrenaline rush you get from carefully wading through and around mud pools, hoping not to fall in, while also avoiding stinging nettles (which bloody hurt) and blackberry brambles. We had a lovely picnic but it POURED with rain halfway through my sandwich.
We went to Dunwich, another pebbly-beached, brown-watered wind trap. Apparently, Dunwich was once a thriving town but has since been swallowed by the sea and on a lucky day one can find human bones washed up from what was once the church’s graveyard. Then we moved onto Southwold, one of England’s thriving seaside towns, where we saw yet another brown, pebbly beach. This time the English, who were having a summer holiday whether the sun joined them or not, swam and built sandcastles in the freezing wind and rain. We half joined them in their pretend summer and went paddle boating around a pond full of ducks and a swan. I enjoyed myself until water began to dribble through the paddle holes in the side of the boat and then I let Ol paddle himself on his own.
Ol and I also took ourselves out to Norwich for the day by train. We visited the largely intact, massive Norwich Castle, went shopping, avoided the Hell and Damnation-focused preachers on the high street, saw the Helmans Mustard Museum and walked down an Art Nouveau arcade.
Between mud and preacher dodging, human bone spotting and the paddle boats we have been having an exciting time in Suffolk - it has been lots of fun.
Last weekend I bravely took myself down to London on my own to catch the underground tubes on my own and had a good time. I stayed with my mum’s school friend, Judy, in Highgate, a richer area where Razorlight’s lead man went to school, and near where Michael Palin, the Twelve Monkeys/Monty Python director and Kate Moss live. I got the guided tour. Judy took me to Hyde Park where I saw the Princess Diana memorial, Prince Albert’s memorial and went to the Victoria and Albert Decorative Arts museum, where Judy had one of her and her sister’s t-shirts on display in the 20th Century exhibit. We also visited Harrods where we saw Sphinxes in the Egyptian room all with Muhammad Al Fayed’s face, a well-endowed Egyptian belly-dancer dancing and flicking her hair in the seafood section and a normal-sized, organic chicken for £19.36, approx $NZ48.40.
The next day I met Monica (my flight attendant friend who flew in for the day from Dubai) at lunchtime and we visited Trafalgar Square, Soho, 10 Downing Street, Big Ben and saw the London Eye. That evening I went out with Judy, her husband and daughter for a very nice Japanese dinner, Pistachio ice cream and Goth-spotting in Camden. And I successfully caught a number of tubes in the underground all on my own across London.
Today is our last day in England as we fly out at 5pm to Spain. Woohoo sunshine here we come. Good-bye terrible weather and cold, hopefully, good-bye CCTV everywhere, good-bye poo-brown beaches.
From Sophie and Ollie.
