Righto, as Paul mentions, we've been burning the candle from both ends rather a lot. This has only been sustainable at times with strategically placed nana naps in the late afternoon (but don't tell anyone!!!). Caught the Eurostar from Paris to London, which was really convenient and time effective - would recommend it! Our B&B was only a 3 minute walk from Kings Cross St Pancras station; some would say how lucky, but others would know better! Our first day saw us walk down to Regents park - and we had SHADOWS!!!! This is a great thing to have in London. We take them for granted in sunny Perth, but you do start to miss your shadow when it isn't there for extended periods. Tara in particular as the tolerance for cold is not that high! We spent an hilarious afternoon watching an amateur cricket match, ably commentated by Paul Rolfe OBE (Order of Beer and Entertainment). He had me in stitches - and we bought our latte's from the "Honest Sausage" - the English have the best names for things! Oh, and we walked past Cath's old workplace too, on the Euston road (is that right Cath?). London is always a fantastic place to visit - as Samuel Johnson said 'A man who is tired of London is tired of life', or words to that effect. We were also very excited about going to the Tower, for the first time in how many times to London!? You always have to save something for next time though!!! It is a funny thing watching your husband on the travelator going past the Queen's Jewels and waving to you with a big goofy smile on his face...and then going back the other side of the jewels a second time with the same big cheesy on his face. Who needs jewels when you've got that!!!??? We also took in a West End show of Chicago at the Cambridge theatre - it was brilliant and we both enjoyed it. Our times in London - as with Paris and many other places is always different, but always brilliant. I guess because we are relaxed and, well...on holidays!
3 nights in London is never enough, though we did cram a lot in - and you may be interested to know that we were privileged to be in the room next to the "Ergh Brothers". They are a famous European duo who come in really late in the night, grunt to each other and go 'eeeerrrrggghhhhh' a lot at the end of sentences - sometimes in the middle of sentences even to perhaps accentuate a point being made. they were also incredibly talented at slamming doors and snoring so loudly you could hear them through the walls. Like I said, privileged we were to have them next to us for 2 nights. We definitely missed them on our last night - slept far too soundly!
A stay in London must be punctuated by an obligatory trip to Harrods. Wearing our best jeans, sneakers and t-shirts, we asserted our spending capacities amiably...in the pet section. Yes, Rooby is the lucky recipient of our only purchases from Harrods (aside from our lunch of course). Unfortunately, there will be no purchase for fluffy Tigger this time, poor little fluff - miss her so much.
London was a big shopping expedition for Paul once again - Football Manager, Motorhead t-shirt, cd's, tube map poster (quote of the day from the guy who served us ' you can get smaller versions of these for free at the tube station you know' HAHAHHHAAA! Then i said we forgot to bring our glasses...good one Tara).
Next stop, our much awaited visit to Oakley via Oxford by train. Picking up our car in Oxford we obviously made a good impression on the young man as he upgraded us from a perky little Astra to a flash Mondeo (we called it Monty, which is an irony as we don't name our cars at home, only those we hire). After a minor directional mishap (kinda going south on the A 34 instead of West on the A 40...) we got to Oakley like homing pigeons. BIIIIGGGG hugs to Maureen and Joe (most affectionately called Mo n Joe from now on) and were even wonderfully surprised by a visit from Josie as well (these are Paul's dad's family. We stayed with Mo and Joe for 6 months when we were in England in 1998-99). Is always brilliant to meet up with them and slip into our chairs and look out the window over the fields, sit out on the patio and have a cuppa, counting butterflies for 15 minutes because David Attenborough told us to on the beebs. I thoroughly recommend Joey's sloe gin if you are ever in the area - superb!!! And there is a crisis in butterfly numbers in Britain at the moment; I counted 8 in 15 minutes. DO you know how hard it is to count butterflies and try not to count the same ones twice!!??? try it some day, preferably with a Pimms or similar in hand.
Our times with Mo and Joe are never long enough and we look forward to having them over in 2013 - we're holding you to it!!! Thinking that we'd be down in Cornwall within 4 hours or so, we were proven sadly wrong, and instead of arriving at 4 as thought, we rocked in about 7.45 to find that the B&B owners wouldn't be back unitl 8.30. What to do??!! Go next door to the pub, have a pint and eat lambs fry and bacon is what you do! We also worked out in Cornwall that it pays to have a thick skin, as every set of eyes turn your way when you walk in. it's like there is a stranger alert signal go through the room. Heads turn in slow motion as you walk past, like a Mexican wave except in Cornwall and with people's heads instead of arms...maybe you can imagine that, or maybe the people in a crowd at a fashion show (though this is a long bow to draw as like I said, jeans, sneakers...).
We thoroughly recommend Portreath though as a place to stay - little beach 200 metres away, good food, close to lots of places and friendly people, once you get over the staring thingy. We were here for some possibly surfing and for Tara to do a bit of ancestor hunting in illogan, Redruth, Gwithian (which was a goldmine) and Phillack. We also had the worst (Truro) Cornish Cream Tea and best (St Ives) Cream tea, bought a limited edition print from the wife of an artist, visited some cemetaries - a bit weird i have to admit! - and drank an awful lot of beer and ate even more bacon and eggs. The trip just seems to get better and better!
Thanks to everyone who is taking the time to read our blogs - if you have any hints, tips or comments on what we should talk about then just let us know! A big thanks to Phil, Hellen and Britta for their comment what seems like 3 million years ago! Love to you all and hope all is well!
