The Prudential Ride London – Surrey 100 and the Surrey
Classic bicycle races came through our village on Sunday 4th August
with the some 16,500 amateurs starting in the morning as part of the Surrey 100
and then later in the day the 150 so professionals came through as part of the
Surrey Classic. Our village of Westcott is about 60 miles into the 100 mile
course and is just before the challenging Box Hill stage. Somewhere amongst the
amateurs was Boris Johnson – the mayor of London.
Monday, August 05, 2013
Harvest Time…
After a long cold winter and a poor spring we have
eventually started to see some decent plant growing weather settle in for a
while and the veggies in the garden are responding to the warmer temperatures
providing us with some long awaited produce. We have dug all of the potatoes up
even though they might have grown larger because the plants have been raided by
a badger - we think (the clumsy brute has done as much damage by stomping
through the crops as it did from digging up the tubers).
We had some early beans a while back and are now on to
the main crops, also we have raised our onions and garlic with mixed results –
the red onions are always a struggle with their tendency to bolt and the garlic
suffered a little with the wet weather, some of it rotting off, but the white
onions and shallots did quite well.
We have high hopes for the squashes and pumpkins that
seem to now be doing well, and the new greenhouse is full of healthy looking
tomatoes, chillies and even a few exotics such as a watermelon a regular melon
and a couple of cape gooseberries.
We have enjoyed a couple of meals now where all of our
veggies came from the garden including a roast on the weekend that included various
types of beans, carrots, chard, broccoli and cauliflower, courgette and
potatoes.
Costing up the price of the seeds, compost, tools and
other materials used without even considering the labour effort we are never going
to see a commercial return for our work, but in terms of the rewards in the satisfaction
of growing and serving friends with our hand reared food, and the exercise we
gain, then we are quids in.
More of wot I have seen…
This band played at Bertram Bees on Friday night to an
enthusiastic audience. They play skiffle versions of well known pop songs
including Walk of Life by Dire Straits, Bad Moon Rising by Creedence Clearwater
Revival blended together with I’m a Believer by the Monkees, Three Little Birds
by Bo Marley and Nutbush by Ike & Tina Turner blended with Delilah by Tom
Jones. The uniform for the band seems to be Hawaiian Shirt and linen suit with
a hat, and the hats change with the songs – in the end half the audience ended
up wearing a hat at some stage.
We went to the small but perfectly formed Surrey Bluegrass Festival in Mickleham village on Saturday and saw plenty of banjos.
One of the acts bowled us over, a three piece of youngsters who played some
amazing original music and sang great harmonies and were called Ghost Town Showdown.
They reminded me a little of Munford and Sons in their style and delivery.
Monday, July 29, 2013
Drinking, Dancing and Nuptials…
We have hardly had time to stop in the last month or
two and so it was when we went as guests at Erica and Tomasz’s wedding in
Poland recently.
Along with good friends of ours, Chris and Carole, we
decided to tack on a side trip to Berlin which is nearby before driving just
across the border to Szczecin.
At Berlin we stayed at the Marriott which was built
after the reunification on ground that was part of the death strip on the East
Berlin side of the wall.
After arriving in Berlin we decided the best way to
see the highlights in the short time we had was to jump on an open top bus that
ran in a loop around city. And being as it was a hote day this proved to be a
wise idea.
We started near our hotel at Potsdamer Platz, a place
renowned for the musicians who stayed here such as David Bowie and Iggy Pop.
There are several sections of the wall displayed out side the new underground
station.
The tour took us passed all of the major landmarks and
we jumped of to get a closer look at Checkpoint Charlie where there are more
sections of the wall on display along with information and actors dressing up
as US Soldiers for the tourists to get there pictures with outside the
checkpoint box. We also got off at the Brandenburg Gate which Sue and I
revisited early the next morning before the crowds appeared when we went
walking in the park and visited the very moving Jewish Memorial.
Berlin is still undergoing a lot of change with roads
dug up and cranes littering the skyline and it has a very vibrant cultural
community with high brow classical events alongside underground raves, gay
clubs, burlesque clubs, music, dance and theatre of all sorts to choose from.
Feeling too old to go to a night club and not feeling intellectual enough for
theatre I found us a place that I thought might suit us better. We went out dancing
the night away at Clarchens Ballhaus with Cha Cha Walzer & Co. this was a
fabulous rough and ready old dancehall that hosted old school dancing of
different types – tonight was the cha-cha and waltzing. The place was really
buzzing and surprisingly full of youngsters in groups or as couples watching or
joining in with the enthusiastic dancers on the floor. There was a DJ who was
playing a variety of music from classics to more contemporary music alternating
the beat so that the dancing alternative from waltzes to more free form jive
dancing. I had done a little bit of jive dance decades ago so I dragged Sue out
for a few spins of the floor. It was a great night and inspired us to think
about finding somewhere to do more of this when we get back to the UK.
As we drove off towards Poland we made a couple of
detours and found a lovely lakeside village of Altenhof and another one at Penkun.
We crossed the border without any fuss just a sign at
the road and different speed limits (they seem to drive faster in Poland – at least
the taxi drivers do). Szczecin was a very pleasant surprise to us as we knew
next to nothing about the country and city.
We stayed at the lovely Hotel Atrium that was a short
walk away from the plac Jasne Blonia, a lovely park with informal and formal
gardens spread over many acres including a lake and an impressive open are
auditorium.
The visiting wedding party arranged to meet at Café 22
which was at the top of a tower with a view across the city. The café seemed to
be set up mainly for deserts and they certainly did some fabulous cakes which
we ate and washed down with wine as the sun set.
The wedding was held in the Dukes of Pomeranian Castle,
an imposing group of buildings in the old quarter of the town surrounded by a
great collection of churches and other structures of grand architecture.
The bridal party arrived in a horse drawn carriage and
we were guided into the vaulted hall where the civil ceremony took place. It
was a lovely venue and we could participate full as they provided an interpreter
for the none-Polish speakers of us.
The party afterwards was held at an allotment, which
sounded strange until we got there and found the these allotments were more
like a collection of holiday homes in fabulous gardens (some even had satellite
dishes on the top). In the middle of these allotments was a lovely hall that
faced out onto a green and it was here that the party began.
At the table were soft drinks, bottles of wine and
bottles of vodka. There were a few speeches and some toasts made with the vodka
and then the food came out, masses of lovely colourful and delicious food. We
thought we had come to the end of a sweet dish, but it was merely a pause as
more savoury dishes followed on all through the night.
Dancing started formally with the bride and groom
performing a piece they had learned and then it went on into full on party mode
with more dancing and more vodka. Knowing we were leaving the next day to
return home we were kind of glad not have to repeat this on the second evening
of celebration. There was perhaps a little too much vodka for some of us and we
left by midnight not staying t witness the conclusion at 4am.
On our drive back to the airport in Germany we had a
short break at an old walled town called Templin where we had an ice cream in a
small man made beach next to the town hall.
Morris take Bath…
This year’s annual Aldbury Morris outing was to Bath
and its surrounding environs. We all met at the lovely Griffin Inn for a few drinks and music and
singing.
The next day was going to be a hot one and we were
concerned about the welfare of the dancers but they started at a good pace as
we travelled around the town from dance spot to dance spot (otherwise now as
pubs to the layman) until we ended up at the river where we boarded a suitable
vessel for the trip upstream. At Bathampton we disembarked and made our way to
the George Inn where lunch was provided and the side danced some more before we
returned via the river and had some time off before our dinner that evening.
The following day we had some time in the morning
before we were to meet at The Cross Guns at the picturesque hamlet of Avoncliff
where the river, canal, railway and road meet in a pretty little valley.
Sue and I walked along the canal towpath for a while
until we come to a large tithe barn with a few quaint shops and had an
ice-lolly as we watched families and canoeists messing about in the river. We
walked back through the fields briefly harassed be sheep until we returned to
the pub where there was another few dances performed before lunch and we
dispersed on our way home.
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