Merry Christmas

I'm just recovering from breakfast at the Bests. Margot, Mike and Sasha have spoilt me again this year - YAY!

I can't describe how wonderful it is to just chill out after a very hectic couple of weeks and of course the move on Sunday (WTF was I thinking?).

A huge thank you to Kat, Sharon and Andrea for all their help.

I'm going to have to whinge about that fact that Nic not only didn't help me load the van, but she also left 4 bags of rubbish behind - thank you very much!

Nevermind, I'm chilled now, really I am.

Sasha has gotten oddles of presents and he's a bit confused about what he should be playing with but at the moment the Roary and Chris are winning, along with the DVD that goes with them. I very cleverly got Sasha and Andre's presents mixed up so Andre will have a lovely coat that's way to small and Sasha was a lovely red jacket which is way to big.

OK, I have a couple of hours to recovery before Christmas dinner - yummy - can't wait!!!

Have yourselves a merry little christmas.

Jane xxxxxxxxx

Sierra Leone

The Sierra Leone trip is on hold until we hear back from the SLTU about when they want us to come over. I've just about got over my hissy fit about this and I understand the rationale behind changing the date it's just making my life more difficult.

On the positive side(?) I got three injections today, Yellow Fever included, so I'm all set to go, well except for the Malaria pills, which I really don't want to take since I really didn't get on with them in Vietnam and in the end stopped taking them.

I'm looking around my room and starting to plan the rebunk for E17, but it is daunting.

I'm going to upload some pics of Sierra Leone and then take a break from the internet as it's very slow at the moment...

Road Trip, Road Trip, Road Trip

This weekend Kylie, Sharon and Agneiska and I are off to Bruges. It's Kylie's brilliant idea and I can't wait. I don't feel like I've left London in ages, let alone the country ... ok it wasn't that long ago, but it feels like ages.

We want to spend some time at the Christmas markets, which means lots of mulled wine....



I'd like to get another external hard drive for Mr Mac 'cos I'm super paranoid and I figure it won't hurt to get another as an additional backup.

Since I'm about to move I'll be doing my best not to purchase too much so will just enjoy the break and being with good friends and maybe a bevy or two...

Battersea Car Boot Sale

Kylie and I took off from home in an overloaded Ford Escort to brave the wilds of Battersea's Car Boot Sale on Sunday. I very sensibly chose a sale which didn't start until 1pm. We did however get there early and were turned and told firmly to come back at our allocated time. After several too numerous to mention point turns Kylie weaved us out of the maze of the lovely council estate that the car boot sale was in the middle of.

Feed and ready to face the crowds we returned. Stopped off very briefly at the British Flag, the local pub. Upon entering everybody just stopped and stared. Exiting the toilets, Kylie suggested it would be polite to buy a drink since we used their facilities (which were spotlessly clean, perhaps because there were no other females). However, since we were again the centre of attention, I suggested I would prefer not to be the entertainment for however long it took me to scull my drink. Kind of like Cheers, but then really not...

So we parked up and were swamped by eager buyers. Before we had even unloaded the car I had sold at least half of my stuff. Somebody said he'd buy all my DVD boxsets and that was before he'd even seen them. The Mac and mobile phone went as quickly as did the TV and PC monitor. I took oddles of stuff and returned with 12 DVDs and my chilly bins, which I'm quite happy about. I don't know what they're called over here so nobody had a clue what I was talking about.

Unfortunately whilst we were being surrounded by the hoards somebody took off with Kylie's camcorder, speakers and a Starwars game so her most profitable sale items were gone. Once I'd been told where Kylie had gone (in hot pursuit) I threatened to hunt down and kill anybody that stole anything, which got me some very startled looks, but seemed to work!

Agnieszka, the wonderful woman that she is, came along with much needed coffee and did a good sale pitch on anything anybody showed the remotest interest in.

So I came away with over £400 which is lots more than I expected and I got rid off all my big stuff so the shift will be slightly less traumatic. We were only there for two hours but both knackered and Kylie, bless her, is well poorly today, trying desperately to hack up a lung.

Go to Kylie's blog for her account of the day...

The Early Years

I've been thinking of my childhood a lot recently, for obvious reasons. I don't think I know anybody (well maybe Merryn) who loved their childhood as much as I did. Well other than being convinced that Niki was trying to kill me ...

Think of the freedom we had. Spending all day going to and from Sandow Riding School. All the adventures we had along the way. The horses, the open spaces and bicycles and definitely our family. Niki may have hated having us (ok, that's probably just me) tagging along all the time but I guess she didn't have much of a choice in the matter ... I would certainly have squealed quickly enough if she tried to leave me behind! Remember the Commonwealth Games, how amazing was the summer of 1974. Precious McKenzie pulling me out of the pool after Niki convinced me I was jumping into the shallow end (see para 1).

The way I never got in trouble for taking off to Rakaia on a Friday after school, having snuck out in the morning with my clothes stuffed in my school backpack. The kindness of people giving me a lift to Riverina and especially the kindness of Bubs who suddenly had an extra mouth to feed for the weekend.

I don't necessarily think we grew up in a safer time. We were lucky (the odd misadventure aside) and we travelled in a pack, ALWAYS. I really can't remember spending any time alone as a kid. I can remember Dad being worried about how attached I was to Arthur and there I was thinking he was jealous that I had a second father figure ... I'm guessing that's not what he was concerned about. See the photo below for Jane in early pure drama queen mode as Ken and Arthur prepare to leave Newbridge Place.



PS: I'm not commenting on the rugby other than to say my worst nightmare came true

Rugby World Cup 2007

I'm guessing this is going to be a very stressful six weeks for me. As much as I'm looking forward to seeing the All Blacks play, I know how incredibly nervous and shouty I get so I'm guessing Nic and Kylie will be ready to kill me by the end of it all.

It's 7.30pm Friday evening and I'm massively hungover and just want to sleep. I've made it as far as my bed and am determined to stay awake long enough to watch the opening match between France and Argentina.

I've just seen a bit of the opening ceremony and not sure if the French have developed a sense of humour or not ... it looks like the performers are doing frog leaps - can't help but wonder if that's intentional...

So the very good news is that the games are all at very sociable times and all on terrestial tv - YAY.

My usual rugby watching buddy, Margot, is in the States at the moment so shall have to train Kylie up, I think.

Anderson Road Trip

Glastonbury 2007

I finally have my photos back and other than the often appearing finger on the edge of pics they came out well and brought back great memories and good to see I included a photo of the corridor of casualties where so many of us fell...

Missing Sis

I miss my sister but I know she's happily back home with her hubbie and dogs and she'd had enough of London. NOT trying to make her miss London with this photo I took years ago from a bus.

I spent the weekend having a Glastonbury clean up in the sunshine. When I opened the tent bag I was overcome with Gastonbury fumes and memories - ah the sweet smell of mud....

It tooks ages to clean up my backpack. Which I blame entirely on the old guy in a suit who threw all the gumboots on top of the packs in the storage area of the coach - bastard!!!

I've washed my Sketchers twice and the mud stays exactly where it was before I tried, what's that all about???

Kylie and I just went over and saw Frank next door to thank him for looking out for Kylie's parcel (which never arrived) dropping a not so stuble hint that we'd like him to do the same tomorrow...

I'll well hooked on Heroes - just over halfway through the series I think. I started to like the character, Peter, the actor who I detested so much in Gilmore Girls.

I have a big meeting tomorrow which I'm sure is going to go haywire, there's just too many things that can go wrong, and no doubt will. I think after work I shall treat myself to something lovely and Londony.

Rye - Sunday 8 July

We drove back to Rye on a much more direct route than we had taken the previous evening and went in search of a place to eat breakfast that was open before 11am.

We finally found a lovely hotel that put us out the back in the bar where I read the tennis section of the sports section and started to stress on Federer's behalf...










We wandered around Rye checking out the open shops (not that many before 12pm) which were mostly 'antique' shops and I saw lots of things I would have purchased if I a) had money, b) had somewhere to put them.


We drove from Rye back towards London stopping in at Hever Castle which was overrun with children and we took off as soon as we finished the castle viewing (pretty much ruined by American taste) and checked out enough of the gardens to realise that there was going to be screaming children everywhere.

We marvelled at the Englishness of driving out to the countryside and picnicing in the parking lot of an attraction.

We drove back to Croydon and aimlessly wandered around until it was time to meet up with Kylie for Die Hard 4.0. YAY - got to love a no-brainer action film - this was just great fun. Nowhere near the appeal of the originals, I was mightly distracted by how white Bruce's teeth were, which reminded me of the only episode of Friends I enjoyed, when Ross over did the teeth whitening and glowed in the dark...

A Walk on the Wild Side - Saturday 7 July

Thanks to Kylie's website ane Anne's enthusiasm we found a great walk (although legs still recovering from Warwick Castle) which led us around the village of Pembury, taking us through many fruit orchards and up and down hills and around lakes (where we got a bit lost) and through forests and tackling lots of mud (Glasto flashback).

We saw a great variety of landscapes and the use of farmland in such a small area.


The view from the top was lovely and well worth the trek, I did try and take a short cut on the way back but Anne wouldn't let me and I'm happy we carried on as we met some nice horses and saw a bit of cricket.

We finished up in the Camden Arms for a quick drink and packet of crisps before heading off the Rye, which was packed so we ended up driving to Hasting to find somewhere to sleep in a seaside hotel on a wonderful angle which meant that when you got out of bed you were propelled downhill to the bathrooom...

We had a nice dinner at a local Italian restaurant where the waiter seemed to know everybody and did his job very well

Penhurst Place - Saturday 7 July

Home, Sweet Home

Well in our dreams anyways.... Anne and I both feel in love with Penhurst Place and it's beautiful grounds. To think that they gardens were first designed in the 13th century.

The family history was very interesting with some members of the family having very distinguished careers and appearing to be good people.

We just missed the market as we arrived a bit late (a common theme throughout our travels). We got waylaid in Royal Tunbridge Wells where there was a great French Market leading into the excitement of the Tour de France, which we had carefully made our plans to avoid... Brought lots of stuff at the market, including spending a ridiculous amount of money on sweets which have since made Ian and I feel very sick.



I would highly recommend that anybody go to this beautiful place. I think we were lucky that the weather came right just as we got there and there were very few other people there so you could easily feel as through you were the only people there, especially with the way the gardens were split into separate spaces.

I made the most of my holidays to have another cream tea, which are never as good as you expect. I remember having a wonderful one in the Blue Mountains many, many years ago and nothing has ever measured up since, not to say that I don't keep trying...



This is Anne's official pose for photos!

Warwick Castle - Friday 6 July

Whilst Lazy Bones Anne was dragging herself out of bed I went and collected the rental car. We packed up whilst speaking to Ma and Gilly who had phoned to see how Anne was getting on in the UK/Europe.

Another road trip - YAY!

We did a very quick drive through Windsor with a quick glimpse of the castle as we drove by...

Although not a weekend day, Warwick Castle was very busy, filled with screaming childen, an inappropriate band and lots of Americans.

Exploring Warwick Castle

We started by visiting 'The Kingmaker' attraction which recreates the mid fifteenth century world of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, Kingmaker. Pretty naff, highlighted by the fact that they put real people in as models which was quite startling and my favourite bit was the moving cat's tail which squeaked alarmingly.

We watched 'Winged Warriors', the birds of prey performance which had a wide selection of birds such as eagles, vultures, owls and hawks.

We also saw the dungeon, which interesting tourture equipment, followed by 'The Royal Weekend Party. In 1898, Daisy, Countess of Warwick hosted a weekend party at which the principle guest was the Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, which is reenacted in a style (Versace overblown style that is). Rather wonderful in a very tacky way...

Next we scrambled up Guy’s Tower which was built in the 14th century. It is twelve-sided, stands 39 metres high and has five storeys and our thighes felt it for many days afterwards!

Next up was 'Dream of Battle' where you can experience the drama, noise and adrenaline-charged terror of mediaeval battle through the dreams of William, a 12 year old squire, as he sleeps the night before setting off to fight for the Earl of Warwick in the most decisive battle of the Castle’s history. You may have guessed that I pulled that explanation straight off the website...

Next up was the Chapel, Great Hall and State Rooms. The Great Hall is the largest room in the castle and throughout history has been its heart and is truely magnificent and looks like the brainchild of the NRA.



The Hall was first constructed in the 14th century. It was rebuilt in the 17th century and then restored in 1871 after it had been badly damaged by a fire which swept through part of the castle.

Sir Fulke Greville, the first Lord Brooke, authorised the building of the small chapel in the early 1600s. It may be on the site of another chapel founded as long ago as 1119.

Retaining portions of the mediaeval Castle of the 14th Century, the State Rooms have been extended, altered and embellished during virtually every century since to lavishly entertain the noblest of guests, and to display the family's most prestigious possessions.

Again, very gaudy and wonderfully OTT.



We checked out the pump house and gardens on our way out as well as stopping off to have a quick chat to the guy that manages the birds of prey. I found the pump house history very interesting, amazing how we take electricty for granted.

We drove back to Streatham in preparation for the second leg of the road trip.

Hampton Court Garden Show - Thursday 6 July

Anne, you again...

Did well making it here - had to change trains at Wimbledon, but knew i was on the right track by following the ladies in their designer gumboots. The show was huge - 13 acres of displays and stalls, the crowds were also large and it made it hard to see some of the display gardens. I unfortunatly might not have any photos of this as although i took the camera - it didnt have a battery in it, so have taken quite a few on the phone but as yet have not been able to get them out of it - watch this space! Anyway trust me it was great, and the gardens of Hampton Court were beautiful.

Wednesday 4 July

Anne - over to you again

Today I headed to Oxford Street again - but with a mission, I wanted to crash an auction at Sothebys. So with a slightly better state of dress and a determined attitude a followed the distinguished looking ladies and gentlemen who had just been dropped of by their chaffeur driven Bentleys up to the auction room. The place was very fully so a stood down the back and for an hour watched 10's of thousands of £'s being bidded for old masters drawings. The highest price was for a Reubens that went for £30,000. I then went round the corner to Hamleys - 4 floors of toy store. Lots of fun with all sorts of toys being demonstrated by very enthusiastic sales assistants. Spent about an hour deciding to buy a rather georgeous collectable teddy bear. Finished off the other end of Oxford Street, and then managed to time it just right so i had a bus full of school kids on the way home.

Tuesday 3 July

Anne this one's for you!

Today I hit the high street - Oxford and Regent Street that is. Quite a shock! I had to cue just to get in the changing rooms in the first shop I went in to - which i later found out was quite usual for Primark (cheap tho). I only made it about 3/4 up the road before calling it a day about 4. So shopped till I dropped!

Vienna day 3

YAY - finally saw the horses of the Spanish Riding School in action. They were amazing. Changing leads on every stride, don't know how they train them to do that, let alone the jumps although I could sort of tell how they trained them to do that (I think...).

Today has been very warm and after the SRS performance we hid out in the museum which was equally amazing. The Egyptian section alone was well worth the entry price and then the Roman section was very good too. After lunch we tackled the paintings, not a huge amount of variety but still very enjoyable.

Next we crossed the square to the natural history museum, which was in a twin building but that's where the similarities ended. OMG it was pretty awful, more like a junk shop masquerading as a museum. Although it probably didn't help that we did it back to front, although all the good stuff was at the start/finish with the prehistoric animals, of which they had quite a good selection.

Have now tottled back to the hostel for the evening, a chill out session. Hopefully our journey home won't be too bad with the UK under maximum security.

Vienna day 2

Opps, it was entirely my fault, missed the practice session at the Spanish Riding School as I just read the 2pm tour and not the email which said the practice was at 10am. Hopefully tomorrow´s gala performance will make up for it.

The Spanish Riding School is beautiful, although the arena is smaller than I expected. Unfortunately the horses have a virus which means that we were not able to enter the stables or touch the horses as it is contagious.

See the following link for more info http://www.srs.at/index.php?id=353

The horses are stunningly beautiful and a lot shorter than I expected. It was very interesting hearing the history of the riding school and also how the horses and riders are trained. They start training the horses at 4 years old and they usually begin performing at 12 years old and then perform until they retire at approx 25 years old when they are retired and generally live until 30 years of age, a very good age for horses. The riders are generally aged 16 when they join and non riders are preferred. Following their training they are moved up a league to student rider where they are trained by the stallions and senior riders. Next step up is senior rider when they train four stallions each and if they are lucky, eventually graduate to the chief rider, these are the riders who perform the difficult jumps. The riders can retire and although no pension was mentioned, it appears they are well looked after.

Our guide, Lukas, was entertaining and told many interesting stories and I can´t help but wonder if he is a failed rider as he mentioned the fall out is high for trainee riders...

We also saw alot of Vienna with its classical looking old buildings and cobbled streets. Dogs everywhere - on the underground (you pay a half price fare for the dog)in shops, and all well behaved. The cathedral was amazing - almost did a tour of the catacombs, but wimped out when I saw them disapearing into the depths. Really looking forward the performance tomorrow. Anne.

Vienna

Naughty Neighbourhood

Here we are in lovely Vienna, with this view from our room's window. Unfortunately no models to be seen...

The drive to Heathrow was sort of uneventful other than the usual six trips around the roundabout until we found where we actually needed to go and most of the time that was pure guesswork.

So now carless and in a city where the traffic goes the wrong way and everything closes on Sunday!

The hotel is ok, now that they've added a second bed ... It's quite warm here, about 23 degrees and thankfully we have lots of windows to open.

Tomorrow is day one of the Spanish Riding School adventures which will follow.

Road Trip, Road Trip, Road Trip

I love a road trip I do and this road trip was extra special as my sister, Anne was along for the ride!!!

I returned from Glastonbury at 4.30am on Monday and within hours we were on the road to Oxford. It took ages to get out of London and I must say Anne's map reading abilities are even worse than mine, which is saying a lot...

After driving around for a while we managed to find a bed for the night at the rather stunningly ordinary River Hotel, on the banks of the River Thames. Our hostess was most definately without the 'mostess'.

We carried out a thorough investigation of Oxford and found lots of university grounds closed but had a very nice stroll until we had an early dinner in an empty courtyard and returned to our delightful abode whereupon I fell asleep for 12 hours ...



The next day, well rested we enjoyed breakfast in the hotel until the fire alarm went off and all the other tourists cleared off and we stayed put finishing off our full english...

Next we drove off to Blenheim Palace (Anne would like to record that we didn't get lost going there) and were among the first to arrive and started off our visit with the new interactive tour with the ghost of Grace Ridley, the Duchess' maid. For more information follow this link http://www.blenheimpalace.com/news/blenheim.htm

We followed this tour with a stroll around the grounds, including the lovely rose gardens, where Anne is a bashful model.



We returned to the Palace for the tour of the state rooms which was accompanied by annoying Americans telling each other that but for Americans the Palace wouldn't exist...

We broke away from them and visited the front of the Palace to see the 'secret gardens' before heading off in search of the Cotswolds. From Witney we drove to Burford which I recognised from a previous visit several years ago. Unfortunately it was just before 5pm and most shops were closing, however, we did manage to do some shopping before stopping for cream teas followed by a stroll through the local graveyard.

We then got very lost trying to find our way to Bath. The upside was that Anne saw some lovely English countryside and pretty houses ... we eventually arrived in Bath and were promptly told to make our way to Bristol for accommodation as you have to book months in advance for beds in Bath.

So off to Bristol we went and proceeded to get incredibly lost trying to find the only hotel that seemed to have accommodation. We ended up picking up a local to navigate us to the Marriott - oh the shame!

Very nice beds so another good night's sleep before getting up earlish to head back to Bath and after enjoying an al fresco breakfast watching students enter the cathedral for graduation, we went on a free walking tour that took about two hours and was very informative and enjoyable. We then did a tour of the baths which were stunning, and nice and warm!



Following this tour we wandered around Bath, doing a bit more shopping and then trekked back to our car after asking directions from some policemen ... Then it was a very slow exit from Bath and a quick and wet drive straight to Brighton where we arrived amid a heavy downpour to find seafront accommodation (although we in the cheap room didn't get the view) for the night. Again an early start for a stroll down the pier (which was closed at that time of day). I looked sadly upon my friend, the helter skelter, before strolling along the beach front and back through the town checking out all the lovely shops before a return to London, via Ikea in Croydon.

Pre-Glasto

Hello World

I should probably be more excited about my sister coming to visit me, but Glasto wins - but only just and it happens first!

I'm off tomorrow by coach (yuck) and meeting Kat and co there (with a bit of luck). I shall be a late arrival as not leaving London until 5.30pm...

Anne arrives on Saturday whilst I imagine I'll be waist deep in mud, minus the gumboots which didn't arrive!

That's it for my first post. Kylie's patiently explaining the wonders of blogging and I really should be going down to the supermarket so Anne has something to eat when she gets here.