REFLECTIONS

I've taken so long to write again. Sorry if you've been waiting with baited breath - breathe in slowly. You know what it's like when you've been away on holiday, even for a day but usually a bit longer, and somehow all the stresses and cares just waited till you got back. Or did they? Do we just not let them engage us in their pressing dance? (Hmm, put that way they sound attractive!)

So that's what I've been doing - picking up all the strings and webs and trailing them along around me. The connections with loved ones are lovely; those with power companies and plastic card not really lovely at all.

We expected to have to move but this hasn't happened yet and hangs over our heads. Medical things have loomed a bit for me.

But I've tripped around a bit - Victor Harbor, Melbourne

The Cockle Train

Rosie, Tess, Max and me in Melbourne

New Bike!! Help!
 

bought a new bike; started swimming in a heated pool and unjoined from a couple of organisations; begun and postponed a radio panel operator's training course. So that's a bit of sorting and clearing done.

Cloaks of Warm

I love the weather - cold at night and in the day too but nothing a bit of wrapping up can't help. I love the fresh apples and other fruit and veg available at the Adelaide Farmers Market www.asfm.org.au every Sunday from 9am they open and it's so good.


 I still think of what's his name on the plane from Kuala Lumpur to London. Jess, that's it! Thank god I wrote it down here because otherwise it may never have happened. Bye bye for now my friends. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

















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The Last Week

So finally I left Sylvia, both of us trying to pretend that we would see each other soon, and was whisked off by Dean to Ely Station and my train to London. I do obsess a little when travelling by myself as to how to keep the luggage to a manageable weight and bulk and strangely I had added another whole bag to that wonderfully light amount that I left my home with so long ago.

Imagine my satisfaction at boarding an earlier train than I expected and being able to stuff my luggage into the rack AND find a seat amongst the quietly awakening commuters. The earlier train meant that I would have more time to get myself plus bags from one enormous London station - the newly refurbished Kings Cross

Kings Cross Station ready for Olympic Visitors

via the underground or bus to my more familiar station Paddington, of  bear fame.

Paddington at Paddington

I've got ahead of myself - there I was smuggly on the train thinking it's all downhill from here when the train stopped at an unexpected station and we were all asked to disembark and reboard a different train that would arrive soon! Using my familiar trick I followed a bloke who seemed to know what he was doing (turns out he didn't) to another platform where a train rolled in with signage nothing to do with London and going the wrong  way. Well, we all piled in and this time there wasn't such a good space for my bags and harder to find a seat and I'd lost my time advantage but nothing I could do except accept.

And I did have time to look at the enormous tubular metal structure and sparkly shops at KC. There was a charming man standing with a giant foam hand on his hand herding commuters to the new entrance, Monty Python like, so I went there to find a bus or an underground but only found chocolates for Ted. Had to come right out again and wait for a lift then find the appropriate underground tunnel with a train going in the helpful direction. And I did.

The underground always looks impossibly complicated at first then I find myself scooting around like anything. One disadvantage for a traveller is that you have no visual idea of where you are travelling. You just go down then along then up like a mole.

Paddington was familiar. I went to a shop to get a new card for my camera - you know the thing that stores photos on it? I made that sort of vague request to the salesperson who looked straight at me blankly whilst shouting to her co-worker 'See what she wants Sandra; I can't understand a word of what she's saying!' !!!

Anyway I was soon on the train back to Devon and Newton Abbot in particular. Did i say that Ted and I were going to France for one day in my final week? And that I was going to do my first recorded interview with a publisher of  profound fame and I was also having a one hour osteopathy massage in Ashbourne? So this week was going to be packed and at the end of it I would be heading back to Paddington Station and the Heathrow and then home.

We began with the trip to Roscoff the following day. Roscoff is an overnight ferry trip away from Plymouth. As soon as we had stowed the car and gone to out cabin we went up to the entertainment deck. The attraction for me was that this ferry was French and so there were beautiful duty free things to look at and a cafeteria full of French food. So there were delicious rolls and cheeses and little bottles of wine. For breakfast they served croissants and Nescafe.

We landed at dawn....

...expecting an industrial port and found this...

...and this...

This supermarket

For Evangeline

This fabulous church

After a breakfast of fresh coffee, crunchy baguette and a croissant, a wander around and then lunch - well one has to eat in France for goodness sake - Ted set off to drive to the next town while i decided to explore Roscoff on foot. It is a beautiful place and if I lived in Devon I would be extremely tempted to move there forever.

We had decided to board the ferry by 7 and so we met up in this pretty little park in front of a boulangerie. So we left this exquisite place to the French and slept in bunks then disembarked in a sleepy Sunday morning Plymouth and drove home, over Dartmoor through sunshine and daffodils. We had good sleeps that night!





Spring had well and truly sprung. Primroses on the sides of the roads where the sunlight could warm them  and in nooks and crannies in Ted's garden; and daffodils, daffodils everywhere. The rest of my stay passed too quickly and before I knew it I was clambering up onto the Newton Abbot Station and waiting for the final trip to London and on to that ghastly business of airplane journeys - well not always but I couldn't hope for such a trip again. The train passes along the coast and this gentleman and I enjoyed the view.

Nearly time to finish this leg of my life. I will wrap up with one more ep before continuing with this blogging fun. I must tell you about the absolutely amazing day I had yesterday - steam trains, friends, famous musicians ..... what a lucky life! X X X X X

CAMBRIDGE 5th/ 7th/13th March

I really enjoyed my visits to Cambridge. The bus trip from Sylvia's was long and I had to be on the bus by 8am so it was the school and college trip too. Each time it was a double decker. Sometimes it was unheated so that the windows had to wiped with whatever was handy. But what you could see! People making their beds in upstairs cottage windows, into gardens over the tops of walls, across wide, flat fields and through the hearts of waking villages.Then the bus would dump us unceremoniously right in the centre of one of the two oldest university towns in England. Why anyone would even consider driving I don't know.

What replaces the cars is the constant stream of people on bikes who ride quite assertively as if hitting pedestrians won't hurt much. As a tourist, the sight of piles of bikes leaning against walls and gates is charming. I don't know if they are pinched on a regular basis but I don't need to care.

There were two highlights of my first visit; a punt along the Cam and Carluccio's restaurant. First the punt. This is David and he had the job of pushing a large flat bottomed boat with me, wrapped in two blankets trying not to shiver, along the Cam behind all those prestigious colleges that make up the University of Cambridge. He kept up an interesting commentary which turned into a riveting discussion about the place of universities in the world. He had the charm to apologise for not sticking to his description and said that it was the best punt he'd had! Try to find him from this photo but you will have to lie on the ground at his feet and look up and back. It will be worth it!

The second highlight of my three trips was the opportunity to lunch at Carluccio's. Antonio Carluccio is a London chef who was born in Italy and I fell in love with his persona by watching a series of programs he made as he wandered around Italy with his stout walking stick. So I was drawn to try his restaurant when I visited Sylvia in 2010 and it didn't disappoint me.

The ambience is a wonderfully relaxed and people are happily eating and talking all around. The service is efficient but warm and the food is simple and delicious. Everything tastes! So happy but frozen to my very core by the river ride, I headed for Carluccio's and was eating my pate and cornichons and drinking a large glass of red wine before I began to thaw out. I had pasta Puttanesca then Tiramisu for dessert. I usually find this a bit too rich (who moi?) so decided to dress it with a shot of espresso which cut through the dish like a hot knife. mmmmmmm.

Bicherin

Then next time I followed lambs liver and mashed potatoes with a coffee combination that was heaven. A dessert and a coffee at the same time plus FUN! On a little tray appeared a cup, and 3 jugs - espresso in one, another of cream and the last full of thick rich chocolate. then you just mixed it in your cup. Genius! Check it out for yourself.   http://www.carluccios.com/menus/cambridge

Tiny Victoria sponge cake - oh yes, and lavendar hearts.

In the UK is a large business called John Lewis Partnership. John Lewis is a chain of department stores and Waitrose is the supermarket arm of this very successful enterprise. The staff all have shares in the firm and many other benefits and the stock is usually considered top class; you know, the best. The service is always good to excellent and the shop in Cambridge is a little beauty. My passion is fabric and there is an area where all kinds of dress fabrics can be found. This is where I went to participate in a Cath Kidston workshop. A group of us ladies sat and cut out hearts of material that we then sewed together and stuffed with lavendar. Gorgeous; so were the nibbles provided by the John Lewis catering service. Charming and fresh and delicious and up my end of the table. Many of the other ladies didn't seem too keen to bog in. There were individual Victoria Sponge Cakes. Someone had to eat them. Above are the hearts and below the lovely teachers. xx

So there you have my Cambridge and I haven't even mentioned the art galleries and the buildings and the museums. tut tut. XX

Welney Wildfowl Trust Norfolk

Sylvia had a feeling in her bones that we should get to Welney to see the swan feeding before the swans had left and when I used Google instead of her bones it turned out that she was right! This will be a word free post as the pics say it all except for the link in case you might want to put it on your own itinerary. www.wwt.org.uk

What a fabulous place! Thankyou, Sylvia XXX

Life in Sutton, Cambridgeshire

Jackie

Sylvia and Richard at Bury St Edmund

I have been staying here with Sylvia in her comfy little semi-detached house since the 27th February. Sylvia suffered from some bad health before Christmas and so had been staying with her daughter, Jackie, until the day we reunited after more than two years. She and I then set off for Sutton. I immediately won her heart by boiling some potatoes and presenting her with a cold salad. So our time together has gone on. Between Jackie, Roxanne, Sylvia and her son Richard, and their loved ones, our lives have been a pleasant mix of interesting outings, often with lovely food, once with exquisite swans, and always involving beautiful villages. I am amazed at the number of these things the British have packed in to this tiny space. I have been in 3 areas during my stay and haven't scratched the surface!

Roxanne and Sylvia at Cambridge Regional College

We went to Outen Broad for afternoon tea; Ely for lunch at the Almonry followed by tree buying for Jackie; an early arrival for the afternoon session of The Exotic Marigold Hotel; my birthday lunch at The Windmill at Orton; swan feeding at Welney(more later); Roxanne's birthday lunch at the Cambridge Regional College; lunch at Wilburton with Allan and Sheila; Bury St Edmund with Richard; Mepal for U3A lunch with Maggie; trip to Holywell to see marvellous cottages and then lunch at another Windmill to try Dean's 5 star rated burger http://burgercritic.blogspot.com/ ; fabulous garden centre near Soham then lunch at a pub on the Ouse; two days of delightful touring to places like Outwell, Upwell, Coveney and lunch at the Anchor Inn on The Gault. How lucky am I with such good friends. I will miss them and wish I could just drop in sometimes for a cuppa.

Gosh, it's the 5th of March!

So much to catch up on! I have let this go a bit from a combination of lack of access to a computer (more later) and either very busy or just lazing around going to the pictures and looking at a new place. I'm with Sylvia, the friend who took me in as a boarder so long ago, when I came to study at Nottingham Trent University. She lives in the village of Sutton, not far from the rather enchanting city of Ely and a still longer bus ride from Cambridge. This is the south eastern quarter of UK and was once covered by wet marshlands that have been drained by us ingenious humans. Some of my favourite reading as a child was Swallows and Amazons about a group of children who had their own boats and would sail away from their parents in the holidays and have adventures. This is nearby their haunts. 



A Rookery

 As we travel around there are the most wonderful vistas of flat green fields with the lacy skeleton of trees reaching up like candelabras, often studded with the nests of rooks. The other evening we passed some rookeries like these and in each nest a black rook silhouette poked up its head. I'll lapse into descriptive prose to cover the lack of photographs.  (Ed. done and dusted!)

My clumsy ignorance of technology remains the same as I cause havoc and destruction amongst those so kind as to let me loose on their lifelines. Sorry to Anne and Jackie; they know who they are and what i did.

 Enough of that and back, back to Belper where I left you having made my pilgrimage to Fritchley with the kindness of Chris. Do you remember how she recommended a trip on the Transpeak Bus? trentbarton.co.uk Well I took that trip and it was a treasure of an experience. The bus is an ordinary bus not a coach and it runs several times a day between Nottingham and Manchester. It is an epic trip and if you are alone there is often a single seat at the front with the whole windscreen view..WOW!



From the bus, somewhere near Bakewell

 The trip takes about 3 hours if you did it without getting off but if you do as my friend Chris recommended and buy an all day ticket that cost me £10 you can just get on and off from 6.30 am in Nottingham until 21.35.

The Roman Baths at Buxton

Chris suggested that I go as far as Buxton where the dedicated readers will remember there was St. Anne's Well, then stay an hour and get on for Bakewell of the tart fame and then an hour later do the same to try out Matlock. These were my personal desirables and it would have worked well except that by the time I was back on the bus at Bakewell I just wanted to get back to The Lion and run a hot bath so I did. The bus travels across the beautiful Derbyshire countryside and if you are lucky you will spend time with the nicest bus driver in the world. He greeted everyone as they got on, often by name, and you felt asthough you were visiting his home. He didn't drive off until the passenger was seated and when they got off he farewelled them with genuine sounding words.

More About Belper

Strutts Mill  above the railway bridge

One of the first cotton mills was built in Belper. The owners were far seeing and provided rows of houses for the workers aswell as gardens and allotments to provide fresh fruit and vegetables. When the railways came to this area the track was put under the streets in an open cutting. As a young child, too small to see over the wall I would hear the whoosh as a train went through and now when I hear it I love it.
Here is my second school which stands at the bottom of the cobbled road of Long Row. There is also a Short Row; no mucking around with ridiculous names here!

Long Row Girls School (as was)

And last but not least the teeny tiny hardware shop that sits across the main street from Georges Fish and Chip Shop. They are so proud of their fish and chips at Georges and with good reason. The chips are freshly cooked, the fish crisply battered and all served in a bright, clean restaurant with photographs of famous 'Georges' on the wall. The wonderful G.Harrison joins the like of G.Burns. No picture here because you just have to eat happily.

Life racketed on and was enhanced by a trip to Newark where you can find the best bacon shop in the world. Porters has been on the corner of the sweetest market square I know for much longer than I have been alive. They stock all sorts of local cheeses, and we're talking Stilton, and condiments that supermarkets often choose not to sell. But the bacon! oh scrummy! So smokey. and they sell 'ends' which i always buy because they are a fraction of the price of the neatly sliced product and often have the smokiest end pieces which transform any dish they jump into. Guess what? This time they had FREE samples of crunchy crackling because they sell their own freshly roasted ham and the skin is not required.


The Best Bacon Shop in the World!



Newark Market



Newark Market Square

The last day of my visit was mooching around packing and spending precious time with Anne and her loved ones. Then I left on Monday to meet up with Sylvia at her daughter's place from where we moved here to Sutton and this post is back at it's beginning!

February 23rd and it's Nottingham

When I walk Around Nottingham I can usually see various aspects of this building just poking up so that I can work out where I am. It sits on top of the Council House which looks over the square in the centre of town. I am quite fond of it.

I moved to Anne's house

where she lives with her family and this amazing puppy, Freddy. He can't keep his head still. Great to live with the love of a dog again.

After a long motorway trip from Devon with Ted we visited my favourite shoe outlet near Leicester, called Rohde. I bought two pairs of boots; one red one brown and very retro to many but exactly right for me. Then Ted unloaded me onto Anne who was still at work and went off to have his own Nottingham adventure. He was born here and so knows it so well. My great grandma was born here and worked as a lacemaker until a Manchester man swept her off her feet.

From when I was about 5 till 9 we lived in a little town not far from Nottingham called Belper.

This is where we lived - 84 Bridge Street. Downstairs was what we would now call a continental deli and we lived on the two floors above. I loved living here. One of the reasons was that we spent time with my Grandma and Grandad who lived in the village of Fritchley quite close by.

I always love to visit Belper and then get the bus to Fritchley but this time everything was a little different. I caught a bus from Nottingham on Monday - well I and 9 others waited at the stop until a really pleasant bloke came to tell us the bus wasn't going but he would shepherd us to another bus which would get us to the appropriate bus. Now I'm a mature person I don't panic too much at this sort of hitch but instead get close to someone who looks as though they are a local and then charm/pester them with questions. Enter Ross who not only seemed to know where he was going but was from Belper too!! And then it turned out that Ross spent his first twenty something years in Brisbane followed by 20 something years in Denmark. My 'local' picking radar went haywire.

Then guess what? After involving several other kind passengers in my search for a way to get to Fritchley, a woman turned as she left the bus and said 'I'm going to Fritchley. I'll drive you there.' This is the absolute joy for me of travelling. This is Chris in her conservatory with her beloved orchid.

She has lived in Fritchley for 40 years and from her house I could see Grandma's cottage blurrily through the trees which turned out to be the best way because the present owners have built on and doubled the size of the once perfect cottage. Chris says that next time I come on a pilgrimage I can just pop in on her. SO lovely. She also gave me a simple plan for tackling my journey for the next day. But that will be for another episode. here's a teaser photo for my next ep. It's a spring called St Ann's Well at a Spa town. Tata! xxxxxxxxx