Northumbria - Week 5
Hi to all and hope this finds you going well. Especially those trying to avoid the winter storms down along the coast in South Australia. We heard there were gusts of over 100kph which is getting rather breezy!
By comparison we are having a wonderful English summer up here with temperatures in the low 20’s most days, no rain for at least 2 weeks, flowers in bloom across the meadows and moors and spring lambs frolicking about, giving the English countryside that picture post card look about it.
This week started with Volker turning 60. Got a Skype call from the daughters Naomi & Nic, who sang a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday along with Dave and the Grandies. It was so lovely getting this from 11,000 km away. Then they, who in collusion with Philomena gave / showed him his present which just happens to be A SWIM WITH WHITE POINTER SHARKS out off Port Lincoln when we gets back to Australia. They didn't elaborate if a cage was included or not though. Hmmmm! Either way - very, very excited about THAT. Cannot wait. Big thanks to you girls. Love ya heaps. Also a big thanks to all who put messages either in emails or on Facebook. Greatly appreciated and loved getting them from all over.
To celebrate this “old fart” milestone he decided he wanted to go out to Hadrian’s Wall again, so we packed up the dogs, a picnic hamper and a bottle of fine bubbles and headed out. We did a walk along another section called Sycamore Gap which is the iconic bit that has featured in movies and is found on most publications associated with the wall. After the walk we then found a picnic spot complete with tables, had a cold chicken and salad lunch with eager helpers and toasted the big event. OK - hardly what some would describe as a major celebratory function, but that’s what I wanted to do - just to be different and because I can. I mean anyone can have a party, but how many can claim they had their 60th ON Hadrian’s Wall. Probably not many, since RomanTimes anyway, because no one else is that boring!
Philomena’s sister and brother in law AM & JD from France dropped in for a visit on their way up to Scotland, and her brother Brian and sister in law Edith drop down from Scotland. Her cousin John and wife Margaret from Sunderland also called by for lunch while they were all there. Phil was in the bosom of her family and was loving it. It’s not too often she gets together with them on this side of the world, so she makes the most of it when she does. Sightseeing, chatting, cooking, chatting, drinking, chatting, eating and more chatting were the orders of the days and Phil was able to catch up on who was doing what, when, where and why as well as reminisce the days and people from her time living up in Scotland. While they were here, we hit the summer solstice with a dinner that extended out a bit. But the thing is - It was still reasonably light at 11.00 pm and an afterglow continued on in the north west until almost midnight. On another occasion we took off to stand in the very centre of Britian at a place called Haltwhistle which just so happens is the town square and where the authorities hung a young couple back in about 1500 and something for daring to try to get married which seems was not the thing to do if one happened to be a Scot and the other a Brit. I guess that was a statement not to be ignored!
Volker disappeared on a few walks with the dogs looking for more ancient rock engravings, coming home covered in mud from the moors and a memorable one of about 18 kms through hills and dales looking for waterfalls. The dogs got a wee bit excited and were a real handful. This time of the year there is so much activity in the moors, tall summer grass lands and forests. Mice, moles, badgers, rabbits, deer, grouse, pheasants,sheep, highland cattle and etc all conspired to get the dogs in a real tizz that day. This in turn had Volker going arse up in creeks and bogs, dragged into a barbed wire fence and coming home caked in mud, blood and cow shit with extended arms that were almost pulled from the shoulder sockets.
Somewhere amongst all this, we were contacted by the owners of the house sit in Spain who asked us if we were prepared to extend our stay of 3 weeks. After some to-ing and fro-ing via email, we are now staying for 6 weeks. Not sure if this is a good thing or not as it will be the height of the summer and from all accounts it gets pretty warm there with average temperatures in the mid 30’s. Guess that’s why they have siestas! I’m sure we can cope with that.
And to finish off the week, Phil's heading back up for more family time in Scotland to catch up with some more relies and spend some more time with her sister and brother. Once we leave the UK in mid July, who knows when they will all meet up again, so she took the opportunity and will no doubt have some quality family time as they all seem to do when they get together for a right old blether.
Bit of a short one this week as we don’t want it getting too repetitive and / or boring as was pointed out to us. So many apologies for that.
Best wishes and lotsa love to all. Stay warm down south.
Cheers
Philomena & Volker
