still in the land of Blighty though and stopping in for a quick update with you folk but running low on battery. Old episode of X Files on the telly, great stuff. Since arrival from Frogland have been busy busy, getting around and about, catching up with folks... Much to update on. A quick synopsis, more details to follow:
Chichester is lovely, very nice little spot. Great church. Old. Just down the road from Goodwood no less, drove past there a couple of times. Spend a nice day in Arundel and had a good look around the castle there. Nice castle. Castle people have nice stuff. Also had a good catch up with the U.K. family, including super cute new nephew.
My glamorous travel companion and I picked up a rental vehicle from Portsmouth, this time a black diesel thing as is the fashion here. A Peugot 2008 I believe, in manual. Also a wretched, terrible excuse for a motor vehicle, even with only 1000 miles on the clock. Prices similarly extortionate to Europe, especially with the full insurance cover, which we have learned is painful but sometimes worth it. Having signed away more of our few remaining dollars we headed off to the Deep South again. Being Cornwall.
It was by now the Saturday of Easter Weekend and the weather was nice, despite forecasts, but the traffic was not. We got there in the end, via a variety of winding a-roads (what they call two-way roads here), about four hundred roundabouts (what they have here instead of intersections, and indeed, often for no apparent reason at all), a variety of motorways, and some more super satnav diversions down dead end roads and to blocked on ramps. Once there we met with adorable nephew and uk family again and spent a few nice days undertaking such wildly popular uk activities as walking around outdoors. Which was nice, as after a couple of fairly full on weeks, I realised this was the first time I had actually stopped for a relax. I was even tasked with bbq duties for a gathering of Cornwallians.
Leaving Cornwall we headed north (via the delightfully named and lovely old town of Dorking, and its many great old-stuff shops) for some more family business of a different kind and finally on the second attempt located the family home of one branch of my ancestry, having been thwarted the last time around by a road closure way out in the English countryside... Only to realise that the dead-end we turned back at last time was only in fact about 30m around a corner from the house itself. Near the house we also located a small church, and in that yard a variety of family graves including that of my great great great grandparents... Quite a thing really. The house itself was occupied, but nobody was home when I knocked. Fair to say the place has probably seen better days, but was nonetheless a large and lovely old building.
That night we were most pleasantly hosted by my future grandparents-in-law in their lovely two-hundred-something year old farm cottage. Everything here is older than everything anywhere else. The pub down the road where we had tea was older again, held up by wonky misshapen beams. I realised with some concern that I am in fact getting used to this flat British traditional ale malarkey... It's not all bad... Although it still needs to be in the fridge. At least blessed Guinness is everywhere.
On the road the next day via a visit to other lovely future grandmother-in-law we clocked up a bunch more miles heading down to south London and set up for a few days at future father in laws currently unoccupied flat in Croydon, where we had to first kill a few local drug dealers to stake our claim on the patch. Actually it's not as bad as everyone here seems to make out, and is, importantly, close to the train to London central. We then went full tourist and did the Tower of London which took the best part of a day and involved an excessive number of photos of armour and swords. There was also a bit of shopping, a lot of pubs, the Borough Markets which are becoming a favourite spot of mine, and quite a lot of looking at antiques, including the London Antique Arms Fair, which was both awesome and depressing...
So that's almost up to where we are at, and more on many of those things in better detail with more complaining and pointing out of things that annoy me will follow. Also I think I got some things in the wrong order. We will fix that later. Battery is on the way out and I have to get up soon. As always, to be continued.
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