Home from the Holiday

Well, home in English terms. We’re back to base after our tenting/travelling trip. Both exhausted, perhaps because we travelled too much and didn’t rest enough. We’ll try not to make the same mistake when we go to Europe next month.

Our trip today was from Kidderminster to Attleborough, some three and a half hours drive if we’d done it all in one go. We didn’t, as both of us were very tired from last night, and anyway, driving that far in one go just isn’t the sort of thing we do very often.

We were tired because we had the heaviest rainfall last night that we’ve experienced while tenting. It poured, and poured – and did I mention? It poured.

But not only that. Sometime between three and four, the wind came up out of nowhere, with huge force, and we were startled to find the tent rocking back and forth, as though it was planning to take off into outer space. We thought it was going to do itself some damage, but nothing got broken, and the worst that happened was that some plastic plates and stuff on one of the tables inside the tent got thrown around, and wound up on the floor. Celia got up and rescued the laptop, which was in its bag in the front section of the tent – the part that doesn’t have an inner skin. Where we were, things were perfectly dry, amazingly enough, but the front section does tend to get a bit of water inside.

I got quite agitated about the tent doing its crazy house thing; started praying loudly, rather like the disciples on the boat when the storm blew up on the Sea of Galilee. Of course Jesus told them to cool it – after he’d dispensed with the activity of the storm. Celia did much the same, finding my agitation somewhat amusing.

It turned out that various mini-cyclones (that’s what the radio was calling them) flickered throughout the country last night: we may have got the tail-end of one.

Wrapped everything up this morning. It had stopped raining by then, but because the tent was so wet outside and the grass too, we stayed in our pyjamas until we’d got everything sorted out, and then went and had a hot shower. I cleaned my teeth, and went to put my dental plate in. For some reason it seemed to catch on one of my other teeth, and next moment there was a nasty little crack as I shifted it in my mouth. The front false tooth had snapped clean off the plate. Great.

We went into Kidderminster and found a denture specialist, but he couldn’t do anything till four in the afternoon. Decided that it wasn’t the end of the world and that it would be easier to get it done back in Norfolk, so I walked around today with a gap in the front of my teeth.

Got ourselves some breakfast – on a takeaway plate (Celia had seen the place advertised at the camp, and it was just across the road from the denture place), and bought some lunch for later too.

Photo on the right is from a site called Dental Distortions. The teeth bear no resemblance to mine.

Chester

Overnight it poured, so by this morning the tent was soaked - only on the outside, thank goodness. But that was enough to make it something of a task trying to get it down and shaken off without covering the inside of the car with water. As it was, I donned my swim shorts to go to the loo: it was easier than getting my pyjamas wet.
Anyway, we left the campsite by the river Ouse where we’ve been for a couple of days and decided to head for Worcester, once again to try and get to see Crowle (and Mamble). Before we left York we stopped off at a café for some breakfast, as neither of us had managed to have more than some muesli, with all the dampness around. We were sitting there waiting for our order, sorting out the most recent lot of photos we’ve taken, when my son Ben rang! And then we realised we’d forgotten it was his birthday, although that wasn’t why he was ringing. Celia explained to the young lady who was witnessing that we were talking to one of our children in NZ, but she looked as though she had no idea where NZ was and if she did, hadn’t a clue how we could be talking to anyone anywhere else.
After breakfast we headed off for Manchester, as a first port of call, and though we thought we’d put the city centre in, found ourselves outside somewhere in a suburb called Heywood. There was an indoor market there, and so we went in and had some lunch: it wasn’t very busy inside, probably because it was still raining a good deal, and the young feller behind the counter was interested in our being from NZ, wanting to check whether it was as dry as Australia. We assured him it wasn’t. It’s constantly interesting how many people have relatives in either Australia or NZ, or who have a desire to go and visit one or both of the countries. There are still many links between the places, even though the European Union is such a dominant force now in this part of the world. I don’t think most English people really think they’re part of the EU, and they wonder at all the Europeans coming over to find work, especially the Poles.
There was a long slow patch on the motorway heading south, so on a whim we decided to head for Chester, as the road was clear. Chester is near the border of Wales, and at one point, while we’d taken a wrong turn in looking for a campsite, we found ourselves crossing the border - while I was typing an email, as it happened.
We’re camping in Chester - the rain has stopped for the most part, although it was extremely heavy in places on the way - and we’ll see whether we spend any time here tomorrow or not.

Out in the Rain

We finally ventured out today in spite of the ongoing rain. (It’s been raining for four days solid - drizzling rather than raining, and more unpleasant for it.) One of the main reasons we got out of the house was because I’d rung a woman called Amanda Jennings at Anglian Worms, and she was happy for me to come and look at her worm farm. More about this visit on one of my other blogs. After we’d been to the worm farm we backtracked a little to Langham Glass, which, like Anglian Worms, is out in what I’d call the middle of nowhere, on an industrial estate. Be that as it may, we checked out the place, which was very busy, in spite of its isolation. Celia wanted to have a look at the people doing glass-blowing, but since this is England, and they charge for everything here, she baulked in the end at paying highly for the privilege. (Particularly since, in Nelson, in New Zealand, we’d seen the same thing for free.) Langham Glass produces some lovely work, however, and we bought some marbles - which Celia almost lost as soon as she got home. Again, in spite of the rain, we carried on to King’s Lynn, which apparently used to be called Bishop’s Lynn because it belonged to a Bishop. (It was a little smaller then.) A lynn is a pool, I‘ve discovered. King’s Lynn would have been better without the rain and overcastness, but it was a pleasant surprise. Five op shops at least, which kept us busy, but also a bustling shopping centre spreading out in several directions. In fact, we got lost at least twice by turning a corner than was curved rather than straight. We wore ourselves out in the end and didn’t get to the church in the town with two towers; another time perhaps. However on the way home we dropped into Narborough, where my brother-in-law had built a house in the past, and had lived there for about eight years. The house has been built up around now, but it still has some distinction - and beach stones set in the walls. Narborough also has a trout fishing place which was set in a delightful park area with pools and streams. And it has an old mill next door, with a rushing waterfall. Since we’d missed out on the King’s Lynn church, we went into the Narborough one. It’s smaller, of course, but quite light inside, as the big window over the altar isn’t stained glass, but almost clear. There was one other person there - also taking photographs. He turned out to be one Mr Spellman, and was taking photographs of the tombs of his ancestors. It seems the Spilmans (as they were called then) were prominent people in the Narborough/Norfolk area, and the church is riddled with their monuments and gravestones. He told us how one ancestor there, a woman, had married into the Spilman family back in the 13th century. Another had been a Recorder, and was buried ‘standing up’ in a large square block. It has his statue on top of it. He insisted on this (before he died, of course) because he’d never been ‘stood on’ during his life and wasn’t going to be after he died. However, as these things turn out, his body was disinterred at some point and is now stuck under the stones beneath one of the pews. So much for dignity. In the picture on the left, the statues of two of the ancestors lie on their sides, leaning on their hands. These are the parents of the Recorder. In the second picture, Mr Spellman isn't praying to one of his ancestors, he's trying to take a photo. Celia, in the wet raincoat, supervises.

Some of the news is bad

I would hesitate to say to the English, ‘get over it’ in regard to rain, though I might say it to some who complain loudly when they've only had thunderstorms and some short heavy downpours.

To those who live in the middle of the country where the floods have been horrendous, I extend my deepest sympathy. I know from NZ news of floods that it takes months and sometimes years to get over the effects of floods. Unless you’re actually affected by it, you think it’s a two-day wonder.

We’ve been immensely fortunate with the weather really – ‘we’ being the Crowls. Sure we’ve had rain, and some massive thunderstorms, but overall since we’ve been here it’s been lovely. Only one day has been cold that I can recall, and the weather’s been fine enough in general for me to wear sandles almost since I got here. And short sleeved shirts. This is almost unheard of.

The photo is of a woman trying to get to work in Knightsbridge, London (yup, London).