First week and a bit: Family, friends, Norwich, Lincolnshire, York, eating and drinking too much.

Belated blog writing … sorry for the slackness and/or lack of motivation … but will make up for it here … will get some words in and add some pictures later.

 

Aunties Sheila and Jacqueline spoiled us very much and helped launch our little adventure. Based at Sheila’s we had a family lunch to catch up with many of the family, including Vicki and her man Rob who had travelled down from Leamington for the day.  Took several trips into Norwich City for pleasure and getting a few practical things sorted.

 

Got to a Canaries (Norwich City Football Club for those who don’t know) game where we drew 2:2 with Blackburn Rovers.  We let them get a couple of goals to encourage their fans who travelled so far.  Cameron Jerome was good – very fast and a dominating presence in the forward line.  An interesting game in that it immediately followed the sacking of their coach, due I guess to us being too friendly to the visitors over the last few months.  The mood of the crowd was subdued somewhat as we appear to be trying to be promoted back to the Premier League next year not this year.  Good game though even though we dropped our team down to 10 men after we scored the first goal so as to make it more fair.

 

Aunties spoiled us by shouting us a night away to Potter’s Resort at Hopton-on-Sea.  The town name is a little misleading and I’m going to write to them to say it should be Hopton-Right-Next-To-The-Sea.  Guess the old town sank and so they built a new one that stayed up.  There was a dinner and a show, then drinking cordial out of small glasses till it was time for morning tea in Perth.  Went to an antique shop in Harleston run by friends of Auntie Jacqueline’s and picked up a few treasures.  On way home popped in on the old church in Kirby Bedon village which was the place of Sheila and Colin’s wedding.

 

So much more ….

 

Met up with Steve and Claire (from Trull days 13 years ago) at the Norwich Parkun.  Now we have “Norwich ParkRun” on our proud list.

 

Morning church service in Norwich Cathedral on the Sunday; many wanders around town; Norwich Castle (museum); get parking fine L ; write appeal and get parking fine waived J - was it the 60 pound bribe I put in the envelope to get the 60 pound fine waived?; then we move adventures further afoot:

 

Drive to York via one-night stay in Boston (Lincolnshire not Massachusetts) and the Lincolnshire Wolds. 

 

When I say ‘drive’ I mean Martha drives.  You see, I was very generous in letting her drive all the time and we hired this nice 6 speed manual Vauxhall Astra (she loves gears so I got an extra one).  Leaving Monday afternoon we were only about halfway to York before dark and I was concerned that the solar battery on the car would run out and cut off the 6^th gear so we stopped at Boston.  Boston was an interesting town because of the interesting things its interesting inhabitants were interested in, but also because a bunch of them set sail in the early 1600’s on a three-hour tour and made it to the other more famous Boston by making a wrong turn at the roundabout.  Luckily their boat was not solar-powered and they made it all the way across the waters just in time for the marathon.  The Arbella I recall was or wasn’t the name of the vessel and their story of fleeing religious persecution and intolerance, setting up life on the other side of the Atlantic is one worth a read. 

 

The big church in Boston is called the Boston Stump, so called because it was the site of the first game of cricket, using a very, very large ball.  Unfortunately the bails fell off and crushed three or four hundred wicketkeepers and so the game was subsequently banned for a few hundred years until they got the proportions correct and safer for the participants.

 

Next to the hotel wherein we stayed was a European deli, and had a chat with the proprietor who was from Latvia.  An interesting conversation where one thinks one thing and then you realise your assumptions are 180 degrees askew.  She told of the times when Latvia was part of the Soviet Union and there being big factories, and then after the collapse of the USSR and joining of Latvia to Europe, the factories closed down.  Her family moved to England to work and make a living.  What my completely wrong assumption was that I thought she was telling me that the big factories under the Soviets was a terrible thing, and so they wanted to get away from there, but actually the closure of the factories simply meant there was no work, so people moved to find work just to eke out an existence.  Gave a sobering perspective on the annoyance of me moaning that I have to go on the train to work each day, for my attitude toward people who are prepared to move countries and continents to improve their family’s lot.

 

After Boston, where we found the Stump closed as play didn’t start till 10, we drove through the Lincolnshire Wolds seeing some beautiful postcard villages, stopped at some postcard shops and bought some postcard lunch (tasted like cardboard), then drove over the Humber Bridge.  That’s one homboggin’ good big bridge.  Bought it too, for only less than two pounds, and the man said we could take it home later because there was no room in the back of the car.