Life Changes....

Cranberry & Almond Granola

2011-08-10T08:56:00.002+01:00

Cranberry & Almond Granola

225g jumbo porridge oats
60g sunflower seeds
60g sesame seeds
60g flaxseeds (linseeds)
60g pumpkin seeds
100g whole almonds (blanched or natural)
150g dried cranberries (or 100g dried cranberries plus 50g dried cherries)
40g dessicated coconut (optional)
1.5 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
Pinch of ground nutmeg or allspice (optional)
1 tsp salt
Zest and juice of a large orange
2 tbsps sunflower oil (or rapeseed - any bland oil will do)
2 tbsps runny honey
1 tsp vanilla extract (optional)

Mix all the dry ingredients (expect almonds, cranberries and coconut) in a large bowl. Add the orange zest.
In a jug, mix the orange juice, vanilla, oil and honey and mix well. Add to the dry ingredients and stir well with a large spoon until all combined.

Spread the mix onto a large baking sheet with deep sides (or two smaller baking trays/dishes)

Bake at about 150 for 30 minutes. Every 10 minutes, turn the mix over with a spoon so that it browns evenly and nothing burns. If your oven (like mine) is really hot, try this at 130 instead. After 20 minutes (i.e. on the second "stir") add the almonds and coconut).

Once the mix is dry and feels crunchy, remove from oven and cool completely. Mix through the cranberries (and cherries if using) and store in an airtight container.

Lovely for breakfast on top of with natural yoghurt - add an extra drizzle of honey if you like it sweeter. If you have any fruit compote then add this as a layer at the bottom of the yogurt. On the photo, I've served mine with the Plum compote from Nigella Kitchen (but I used vanilla instead of cinnamon as my flavouring).

The curse of the bain marie strikes again.

2011-07-02T13:27:00.004+01:00

Remember the year when the shops ran out of cranberries because Delia used them in a recipe on her Christmas programme? Well I don't know if Nigella had quite the same effect, but I was one of the idiots who decided that my life would be complete if only I had a bottle of Pedro Ximenez sherry to use in Nigella Christmas recipes. I think it was Christmas 2008 but I can't be certain.

So, delighted to find said sherry in Sainsburys, I bought a bottle home and, as suggested by Nigella, soaked my fruit in it for the Christmas cake. I tasted a small glass and hated it - it was way too syrupy for sherry, almost cough mixture like. So I shoved it into the back of the cupboard and thought what a waste of money that had been.

This Easter, we were travelling through Andalusia, on our way to Murcia. We'd stopped at this lovely b&b for the night, to break up a long drive.
http://www.elciruelo.net

Because it's away from any villages, we decided to eat in that evening as Gillian was offering a set menu, three courses for 18 euro. Her food was superb - smoked salmon parcels to start, stuffed pork fillet with dauphinnoise for main and a delicious Pedro Ximenez cheesecake to finish - served with a shot of PX on the side. It was so good then we I got home I googled for a recipe and found this one.

Pedro Ximenez Cheesecake:
170 g (6 ounces) digestive biscuit crumbs
40 g (1 1/2 ounces) skinned, roasted and crushed hazelnuts
40 g (1 1/2 ounces) unsalted butter, softened
grated zest of 1/2 lemon

For the filling
1.5 kg (3 1/2 pounds) cream cheese
225 g (8 ounces) icing (confectioners') sugar, sieved
3 medium eggs
2 vanilla pods, cut in half and the seeds scraped out
10 ml (2 teaspoons) vanilla extract (not vanilla essence)
100 ml (3 1/2 fluid ounces) Pedro Ximénez sherry
finely grated zest of 2 lemons

To serve
Shelled and skinned whole hazelnuts, toasted and roughly chopped
To make the base, combine all the ingredients. Press the mixture into a 22.5 x 6.25 cm (9 x 2 1/2 inch) springform tin that has been lined with greased parchment paper. Chill. Preheat the oven to 175°C / 335°F / gas mark 3 1/2.
To make the filling, put the cream cheese in a blender and blend until smooth. Add all the other ingredients except the lemon zest and blend well. Then add the lemon zest — do not be tempted to add it earlier or the mixture will split. Pour the filling on to the chilled base and bake for 45 minutes. Only the outside 2.5 cm (1 inch) of the cake will appear to be cooked; the middle should be wobbly. Cool completely and then chill for 2 hours, or until set. Serve at room temperature. Place a slice on a plate and scatter on the toasted hazelnuts. Serve with large glasses of chilled Pedro Ximénez sherry.

I decided to try making it today. I substitued almonds for the hazelnuts as I had some in, and also have some nice toasted almond flakes to decorate. I halved the quantity of ingredients shown above and still have a large cheesecake that would easily feed 6 for dessert. I've been fairly unsuccessful at making baked cheesecakes before. I tried Nigella's chocolate lime one a while ago and despite wrapping the springform tin in plenty of foil, as instructed, water seemed to get in from the bain marie and made the base soggy. I also have a tendency to overcook them, panicking if the middle looks uncooked.

This time, I thought I'd found the solution. Whilst the recipe didn't call for a water bath to be used, I decided to do it anyway because I thought it would protect the cheesecake from over cooking or burning. I also decided to use a silicon baking tin rather than springform. That'll stop water leaking in, I thought. I've just had a peek now and the base of the cheesecake still looks soggy! Don't know how? Unless there is a tiny nick in the base of the silicon that's let water in? I haven't plated it yet as I'm waiting for it to finish cooling, and then we'll see......

From my sample tasting it seems good though. Not sure it needs the lemon zest..........

Lemon Tiramisu

2011-06-26T13:59:00.003+01:00

Been wanting to try this for a while............. and seeing that it's now summer, I thought I would! It was fabulous and everybody who tried it thought so too! Got the recipe online but added a few of my own embellishments (the lemon curd, white chocolate, almonds and the cream).

Lemon Tiramisu.

Ingredients
3 large lemons (unwaxed)
Half a cup of caster sugar (or 75g if you're a weigher)
1 cup (250ml) of Limoncello
4 large eggs
2 tubs (250g each) of marscapone
3 tablespoons of good lemon curd (I recommend Sainsbury Taste the Difference)
About 40 lady finger biscuits
100g bar of good quality white chocolate (put half of it in the freezer, leave half out)
Small packet of toasted almond flakes.
600ml tub of double cream (optional)
Bottle of Limoncello or Crema de Limoncello to serve with.

Zest and juice the lemons and set zest aside. Add the limoncello to the lemon juice. Set aside.

Separate the eggs, keeping one egg white only. You don't need the rest but can freeze them to make meringue some other time!

Using a hand whisk, whisk egg yolk and sugar until they become pale and thick. Add the marscapone, mix well and then briefly whisk.

Melt half of the white chocolate in a small bowl over boiling water and leave to cool slightly. when cooled, add the chocolate and the lemon curd to the marscapone mix.

In a new bowl, whisk the egg white until it is quite firm. Fold gently into the marscapone mix, along with the lemon zest.

Next, take the lady fingers and dip each one briefy (dip both sides but don't soak them!) in the limoncello/lemon juice mix and make a layer of them in a large dish about 2 - 3 inches deep. Once the bottom layer is complete, spoon and smooth a layer of marscapone mix on top. Add a second later of biscuits. If you have any liquid left, drizzle it onto the top layer of lady fingers but don't add too much. Smooth over another layer of marscapone mix.

If you feel it is needed, whip the double cream and smooth it over the top. I used this because I only had a very thin layer of marscapone cream on the top - I think I used a dish that was too large and I ran out of mix. The end result was good, though, I think the cream finished things off very nicely!

Cover loosely with foil and leave in the fridge to set for about 4 hours. Grate the rest of the white choc (or blitz it in a mini-processer) and sprinkle over the top. Also sprinkle over a handful of toasted almonds.

Serve, with shot of Limoncello or Cream of Limoncello on the side. Serves between 10 - 16 people depending on how greedy they are.

When you wish upon a star.............

2010-07-06T21:47:00.003+01:00

I've never eaten in a Michelin starred restaurant before, so imagine how excited I was to be going here:

http://www.pipeandglass.co.uk/home.php

In fact, not just going to eat, but staying here for 2 nights. It was our 5th Wedding Anniversary on July 1st, so we decided to treat ourselves with a weekend away at the Pipe and Glass. Just over an hour's drive from home, meaning that we could spend most of Friday and Sunday there, too - rather than most of the day driving.

We arrived around 1pm on Friday. Our room (Thyme) was ready so we checked in and got unpacked. Gorgeous room - very stylish, and the finish/quality was superb. We were booked for lunch at 1.30pm so went more or less straight round after we'd unpacked. The weather was gorgeous but we ate inside - starting with a cold beer at the bar. We also ordered a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc to drink with lunch. The plan had been to save some for later on that day but that didn't quite happen! We shared a starter of "A little jar of ‘Gloucester Old Spot' potted pork, sticky apple and crackling salad, warm spelt toast". Very good. The sticky apple was really good. Then I had a salad of 3 tomato, lovage pesto, mozzarella, avocado salad. The cheese was beautiful. Actually, all of it was. Roy had a roasted beetroot, goats cheese and leek tart, with roasted beetroot and pearl onions. We shared the main courses, along with a seasonal salad sprinkled with sweet potato crisps. It was all so good! Then we finished by sharing a bakewell tart with spiced fruit compote and raspberry ripple ice cream - such a generous portion we were glad we hadn't ordered a pudding each!

Back in our room, and unused to lunchtime drinking, we dozed for an hour! Got up at about 4 and had a coffee and sat on the lovely patio before getting ready for an evening at Beverley Races.
http://www.beverley-racecourse.co.uk/

We'd booked a taxi to take us and pick us up. What a stunning evening it was - so hot and sunny. Perfect. We didn't win money, but we didn't lose either so that was good! Back at the Pipe & Glass by about 10, we ordered a cheese plate to share, with a large glass of red wine each. That was also very good. I'm surprised we didn't have nightmares all evening after all that cheese! But we slept well, in a huge, comfy, super king sized sleigh bed. I want one!

Ice Cream update

2010-03-09T12:45:00.002Z

Since buying le Glacier at New Year I've had two subsequent ice cream making attempts. After the success of the Margarita Ice Cream I decided to try plain Vanilla.

Worked a treat, got rave reviews from Roy, Mum, Mum and Dad-in-Law. As is my usual method, instead of just going to one of the many cookbooks in the kitchen, picking a recipe and using it, I spent ages trawling the net for Vanilla ice cream recipes. I printed three and then picked one to use (Mark Hix, I think). Anyway, it worked, tasted great. Served it with Nigella's chocolate brownies. Big hit.

Next time out (last weekend) I tried a coffee ice cream, also to serve with brownies - this time, flourless milk and dark choc brownies. I was trying to recreate the fabulous Honeybuns milk choc brownie and had looked at the ingredients then found the closest recipe I could get online.
http://www.honeybuns.co.uk/
These honeybuns are my absolute favourite brownies - next to Millie's Muffins, the best naughty treat one can buy for a long train journey!

The ice cream (picked the best of three recipes I printed) was excellent. Actually, I could have just eaten the warm and then cold custard mix, it was gorgeous! The brownies were ok - but I went a bit off track by making them early and then re-heating them later. The texture seemed to change - I think the almonds gave up more oil and the overall effect for me was to take away the "lightness" they had when first out of the oven, and replace it with a slightly stodgy greasy feel. Guests (BIL and SIL) seemed to enjoy them though. And the freezer is now full of leftovers....................

It's Margarita Time.............

2009-12-31T11:46:00.007Z

We're having a mexican themed evening at my brother in law's house tonight. This prompted me to volunteer to make Margarita Ice Cream, which I'd seen Nigella do on Nigella Express, and thought it looked good. On reading the recipe in her book, I noticed that it was a "no-churn" version of an ice cream recipe in Forever Summer. I've never made ice cream (churned or not) and having read both recipes, decided that I would splash out on an ice cream maker and have a go at the real thing.

I bought this Magimix, because:
a) it was the least expensive I could find and
b) it got pretty good reviews at Amazon and Argos

I'd always thought that one day I'd buy an expensive (£200+) ice cream maker, as I thought that the "freeze the bowl" versions weren't so good. Time to give it a try.

Making the custard for the ice cream was ok, Nigella gives very clear advice about that, and I do confess I had to plunge the pan in to the sink full of cold water once, to stop the custard splitting!
I made this at about 9am, and left it in the fridge to properly chill for the rest of the day. The bowl for the ice cream maker had been in the freezer overnight. The instruction book was full of warnings about the consequences of the bowl /custard not being properly chilled. No room for error here, this is being served up tonight!

Setting the ice cream maker up was a bit tricky - for some reason, the paddle would only churn when the lid was not on top of the bowl. I'm not sure why. I managed to keep it going by just placing the lid on the bowl, and not properly clipping it on. I'll try again, and if it still doesn't work, may take it back for replacement.

After that, all you do is pour in the custard, and wait 20 minutes. Well, I waited 30 because I wanted to be sure that the mix was as well churned as it could be. It was pretty soft, but after a night in the deep freeze in a plastic tub, it has set a treat. And tastes wonderful! More like Key Lime Pie than Margarita, but that'll do for me. The leftover Tequila and Cointreau will be put to good use in proper Margaritas this evening. We're also having nachos, enchiladas and tacos. And my sister in law has made a Key Lime Pie to accompany the ice cream.

I've also made a version of Nigella's choc chip chilli for tonight. But have just realised that I forgot to put the chocolate in! Doh! It will need warming up so I'll add it later........
Nigella's recipe uses chorizo sausage, but I skipped that, and to get the smokiness into it I used smoked paprika, and some of the Chipotle Chilli powder that I bought back from Florida. And a squirt of Heinz BBQ sauce!

There was custard mix left over, as the Glacier will only take just over a pint of liquid, so I had a go at baking it in some pre-bought M&S small pastry cases. My idea was to have like a lemon tart type of thing, but with lime. Didn't REALLY work. Both the custard and the tart base burnt on half of them, and those that survived were a bit messy looking, and the lime custard:pastry ratio was wrong. Most of them ended up in the bin.

And finally, I had to find some use for the leftover egg whites, and the raspberries/limoncello syrup from the other day. Mini-pavlova, anyone?

Trying something new.

2009-12-29T20:34:00.006Z

I love pannacotta, so I had a go at making it for the first time this week. I had a load of leftover cream in the fridge from Christmas and I used a Jamie Oliver recipe, as I just happened to be flicking through his Happy Days book looking for a chilli recipe, and stumbled upon the pannacotta recipe. (Hmmm, I'm not quite sure why I was in the back of the book looking at desserts when I was supposed to be looking for Chilli ideas.)

Anyway, it turned out to be a lot easier than I'd imagined. Just a bit of heating, mixing and pouring, really. The recipe uses 2 vanilla pods and serves 4 people... I think in future I'd just use one pod, as there were loads of seeds (not that I mind, I love them, but one would have been more than enough). Also, I missed out the step of whipping some of the cream with the icing sugar as I'd already heated the lot up together by the time I noticed it! End result did not seem to suffer, though. This was really good. I didn't have rhubarb, and as the pannacotta was infused with lemon zest, which gave it a slight tang, I decided to make up some Limoncello syrup (boiled Limoncello, lemon juice and icing sugar for a few minutes then left to cool) and serve it with that and some raspberries.

Next time, I want to try a quite complicated coffee pannacotta with fleur de sel caramel recipe that I found recently...............

http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/fruit-recipes/pannacotta-with-roasted-rhubarb

The quest for perfect mash....

2009-12-29T20:11:00.003Z

I love mashed potato. Absolutely love it. To the point where I get quite upset if it is not done properly. We had two quite contrary experiences in Florida recently - one where I served the best mashed potato I've ever had in a restaurant, and the second where I was bitterly disappointed that the chef sent out lumpy mash. And this in what was supposedly Florida's highest rated restaurant - and one of the best in America. How hard is it to get your mash right?

Well, up until recently I'd relied on well boiled spuds, and a good potato masher plus a load of hard work to get mine right. And, they were pretty good. But I'd long wanted a potato ricer, and finally got round to buying one this year. I was impressed with the difference it made (and the mess I managed to make with it).

Back to those Florida restaurants. Cafe Lurcat in Naples sent out the most perfect mash - listed on the menu as potato puree. It was silky smooth and highly seasoned with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Perfect. Beach Bistro on Anna Maria Island sent out what they called a "side of chefs mashed". It had squash or something like that in it - plus the lumps I mentioned earlier. And was luke warm. I'm a bit of a purist when it comes to mash, I'm not really into all those "flavoured" mashes, although I have been known to eat a bowl of it with tomato ketchup splodged on top on rare occasions. I prefer to let the sauces with my food add any extra flavour. In the mash itself I only ever add: butter (or olive oil), cream (or milk), nutmeg, salt and pepper. Usually white pepper.

After the Lurcat mash, I was pondering on what was the extra something that made it better than mine. Especially now that I have a ricer - my mash should be perfect! Then it stuck me that they were calling it puree... so that was the difference. I mentioned to Roy that they must have passed it through a sieve to get it so smooth. Little did he know that a few weeks later, he'd be acting as my commis chef and doing likewise.

So that's what I tried tonight. I made up the mash as usual and then passed it to Roy with a sieve, bowl and silicone spatula. 20 minutes or so later, he'd passed the lot through the sieve and I warmed it up in a pan (having seen this done on tv cooking shows). It was excellent. Although I'm not sure I'd bother with the sieve-ing part every time I make it. That's it in the photograph. Served with pork chop in mushroom sauce and brussel sprouts. Delicious.

Chilli Jam and Chutney

2009-11-21T10:48:00.004Z

I wanted to make Nigella's Chilli Jam last Christmas but ran out of time. Having bought the sugar jam and the cider vinegar, all I needed were some chillis and red peppers, and I was ready to go. I've been collecting empty glass jars all year in anticipation...........

I also had the ingredients to make Nigella's Christmas Chutney (apples & cranberries).

But first, chilli jam:
150gms/5oz long fresh red chillies de seeded and cut into four pieces each.
150gms/5oz sweet red peppers cored de seeded and cut into chunks
1kg/2.2lbs Jam sugar
600mls cider vinegar

6x250 ml/40z sterilized sealable jars with vinegar proof lids (or, if you're like me - a variety of empty jam/chutney jars of mixed sizes)

Put the cut up chillies into the food processsor and pulse until finely chopped. Add the chunks of sweet pepper and pulse again.
Dissolve the sugar in the vinegar in a wide, medium-sized pan over a low heat without stirring. (apparently this keeps the jelly clear)

Scrape the pepper mixture out of the bowl and add to the pan. Bring to the boil and leave it at a rollicking boil for 10 minutes. Now, from reading other blogs, I discovered that some people have boiled for longer. In total, I think I boiled my mix for about 30 minutes and it still set very soft. I tried testing with a cold saucer (a la Delia) and seemed to get some kind of set, so I got fed up boiling it and took it off the heat. Also, halfway through cooking, I managed to turn my attention to other things and the pan overboiled. Made a HUGE mess on my hob.

Take the pan off the heat and allow to cool. The liquid will become more syrupy, then from syrup to viscous and from viscous to jelly like as it cools. This is the theory - mine just stayed soft. It's more like a chilli sauce than a chilli jam - although it does taste great. I wonder if this is because I made a double batch in one pan? Maybe I should have boiled even longer.........

After about 40 minutes, or once the red flecks are more or less evenly distributed in the jelly (as the liquid firms up, the bits of chilli and pepper start being suspended in it rather than floating in it), ladle it into your jars. If you want to stir it gently at this stage it will do no harm. Then seal tightly. Now I didn't stir at this point, and the chilli/pepper flakes all stayed at the top of the jam jars!

Make the jam up to one month before using or giving.
Store in a cool dark place for up to a year.
Once opened store in the fridge and use within a month

My favourite ways to eat this are:
- on brie cheese (or any bland, soft cheese) with crackers
- with lentils, sausages and feta cheese, and a side serving of rocket.

Christmas Chutney:
1 pound 8 1/2 ounces (750 grams) Granny Smith apples, peeled and cored
9 ounces (250 ounces) dried cranberries
1 onion, finely chopped
12 fluid ounces (350 ml) apple cider vinegar
7 ounces (200 grams) of sugar
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander
2 teaspoons of salt

Slice the apples into halves. Slice the halves lengthways into smaller pieces, roughly 1/4-inch width. Place the apple pieces and finely chopped onion into a saucepan with all the other ingredients. Heat the mixture until it is simmering quickly. Cook the mixture for 45 minutes, or until the chutney has thickened slightly and the fruit has become soft.

Spoon the mixture into sterilized jars and screw the lids onto the jars tightly. Allow to cool before storing in a cool, dark place. This is so easy, and tastes great with cheddar, or any other hard cheese. I only made 3 jars of this - one for us, one for my in-laws and the lucky recipient of jar 3 was Fred, our lovely neighbour next door.

Recipes from Nigella Christmas-Nigella Lawson

I still haven't sorted his bench out....

2009-06-15T22:43:00.003+01:00

It is coming up to two years since Dad died. I promised him a bench, looking out to somewhere nice, and I still haven't sorted it out. I've made some half hearted attempts to find out how one goes about organising these things, but there isn't much info out there.

A month or so ago, I had another google and I think that you just buy the bench and memorial plaque and then check with the local authority that it is ok to place it somewhere. There are some rules about how it must be fixed. So I think the start point is to choose a place, get permission and go ahead.

So I was just reading back on the blog of Dad's last days.... bit stupid really as I got myself a bit upset. Anyway I realised that I forgot to mention how, on the Wednesday that he died, Mum came in to his room at about 6am and he looked at her and mouthed "Good Morning". That was pretty much the last time he communicated with anybody.

Mum is in hospital at the moment. She fell and cracked a bone in her pelvis whilst crossing the road last Wednesday. For somebody whose mobility is already limited by her osteoarthritis, this is the last thing she needs. She's now in a rehab unit learning to walk and transfer from bed to chair and back. Not good. But she's battling on and I hope that she gets full mobility and independence back. Knowing mum, she'll be worried that she doesn't. Oh, and she HATES the hospital food.

Sri Lanka Blog

2009-05-23T22:45:00.004+01:00

http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Jan-and-Roy/

Our trip to Sri Lanka is posted on travelblog.......

Sri Lanka Blog

2009-05-23T22:45:00.001+01:00

http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Jan-and-Roy/

Our trip to Sri Lanka is posted on travelblog.......

Back to the '80's

2009-03-08T15:21:00.002Z

Quick update - we decided not to do Yala park. Didn't want to take the chance on not having insurance cover.... having had to use insurance in the past!

Check out Duran Duran's Save a Prayer video. Not only is it a damn good song, but the video was filmed on Sri Lanka. See that big rock? I'll be walking up there a week tomorrow. Yup, all 700 steps. Wish me luck.............

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCD4rtcOgHE

Post cognitive dissonance

2009-02-07T09:01:00.003Z

As ever, immediately after booking a trip, I've become fraught with anxiety about whether I've put the perfect itinerary together. Have I made ALL the right decisions?

Here's the dilemma this time:
We were offered a two night stay in Yala National Park, camping - albeit in a "luxury" tent.
http://www.srilankaecotourism.com/camping_Leopard_Safari_in_Yala.htm
At first we were all for it, and then I got some advice on Tripadvisor from a guy who told me that the Foreign Office have advised against all travel to Yala. This in itself did not put me off - I think there were isolated incidents on the eastern fringe of the (huge) park some years ago - however, while that advice is on the FO website, we will not be covered by our travel insurance if we go in to the Park.

British travel companies have taken Yala out of their brochures for now, but Red Dot continue to offer the camping trip as an option. I asked Ayanthi at Red Dot to take this section of the trip out and put us an extra two nights on the beach.

Now I am tormented - was this the right decision? Yes - absolutely in terms of following advice and keeping insurance cover. No - not if we want to chance to stay in a beautiful setting and see leopard. We've never seen leopard in our safaris in Africa.

Now, IF I can convince Roy to lose two nights of the beach stay, then we could always ask Ayanthi to put Yala back in. Just mentioned it to him but he doesn't seem fussed.... hmmmm... not even the lure of leopard has him this time. Strangely, when we were first looking at the trip he wanted to leave Yala in, it was me who was being cautious........

At last! March trip is booked....

2009-02-06T19:56:00.002Z

Zanzibar and Ceylon were two places that conjured up exotic and exciting images whenever I read or heard about them as a child. I never actually believed that one day I'd see either of them - the furthest I travelled as a kid was inside the UK.

Zanzibar was one of our honeymoon destinations and we loved every second of it.
We knew that we wanted to visit Sri Lanka and this year seemed like the perfect time to do so - outside of the euro zone, not US dollars - in light of our weakening pound, we've had our eyes on Asia or South Africa for our travels in 2009. We've planned to travel in March and November. I've been procrastinating over our March trip for months now. Once I started to research Sri Lanka it became apparent that this was a big island and with a lot to see and do. It seemed unrealistic to try to "do it all" in one trip and that's where the real research kicked in - where to go, where to stay, who to travel with... etc. etc. There are SEVEN Unesco World Heritage sites in Sri Lanka! I've planned that we'll get to see 5 (maybe 6) of them.

We finally decided on Red Dot Tours, a UK owned Colombo based agent. I also had quotes from Kuoni, but I have to say that the travel consultant there could not have seemed less interested about our trip if he tried! Prices were about the same for the itinerary we eventually decided on. Kuoni were trying to flog me a "standard" tour which on the face of it looked fine and was certainly great value. But when I phoned to ask about a private tour and particular hotels I was met with a grudging acceptance that yes, they could tailor make our trip. The guy tried to fob me off with "We don't do that hotel" for a couple of my choices, but when I pushed back on this he finally managed to come up with a new quote. Maybe I pushed him over the edge yesterday when asking for my tenth (and final) price for our tweaked itinerary. I just wanted to sense check the price that Red Dot had given....

So, here is the outline of our trip:

We fly Emirates out of Manchester on Friday 13th (yes, I know!) March. We arrive in Colombo at 8.30am the following day and will be picked up by our driver/guide and taken to:
http://www.reddottours.com/Accommodation/Hotel/hotel.php?code=CulturalTriangle-VilUyana

After four nights here we travel to Kandy, to stay overnight at:
http://www.thekandyhouse.com/

And then we move on to the Hill Country, to stay for three nights in:
http://www.teatrails.com/
This one looks special - it is our extravagance for the trip!

On to the coast, we're staying in two beach hotels - the first on the South Coast, for five nights:
http://www.thefortress.lk/

And then two nights further up the West Coast, and getting us a bit nearer to the airport (2 hours drive!):
http://www.samanvilla.com/

And then we fly home on 29th March. Arriving back at 7pm.....

The research to find the hotels was extensive! Tripadvisor, Fodors, Red Dot's website (which is very good), and various travel blogs that I stumbled across. Oh and the Rough Guide to Sri Lanka book.

https://www.reddottours.com

We've an outline for the things that we want to see - some of them are built in to the itinerary that Red Dot have put together. But next I need to finish my research and have a plan for the other things we can do whilst in Sri Lanka. If it were up to Roy we'd just go and take it all as it comes and decide what to do once there, but in my opinion, that isn't the best way to take a trip.....

If only....

2009-01-25T14:22:00.003Z

If only I'd known that Your Greatest Guide to Calories, 1990 edition, was now worth £10!

If only I'd kept all my old diet books.

If only I had time to faff around trying to sell old crap on ebay.

I was googling around today for a calorie counter book - I can't believe that after a lifetime of trying to control my weight I actually do not possess one of these! I thought that my old favourite - Greatest Guide to Calories - might still be in publication (although I failed to find one in Tesco yesterday) and when I googled found only "antique" versions of it for sale on ebay and elsewhere. Interestingly the 2006 version is only worth £1.99.

So I'm currently considering the latest versions of calorie books and deciding which one to order. Why? I'll tell that story some other time. I have to laugh when I look at the various guides from years gone by - they started out life as Calorie Counters, then Fat started to become important and they began to include this info, too. Now it's Calories, Fat and Carbs. Tells a good story of diet history. Today's version is, by the way, called the Calories, Carb and Fat Bible. I have to laugh at the Bible bit.... dieting is the new religion??? Well maybe not so new, I guess...

I'm a walking case story of diet history. It all started back in the 70's when I left school. My first day at work, the department Manager, Tony Greenhalgh, took me to one side for a chat. Amongst the general "welcome to Royal Insurance" blurble, he mentioned that I was a nice slim young girl and that I'd probably been involved in sports at school. He was right, I'd played netball for the school and generally didn't mind getting stuck in to all the PE sessions we did. Hockey being my least favourite (a winter sport) and Netball and Athletics being the ones I really liked. He commented that making the transition from active schoolgirl to sitting at a desk all day was quite a big one and he recommended that I join a sports group at work. We had a staff sports facility (and bar) and in his opinion, it would be good to get involved in things like that. Otherwise, I might start to put weight on. He'd seen it happen before. I remember mentally rolling my eyes at this - Tony Greenhalgh was a big fat, ever so slightly sleazy looking guy in his 40's. What would he know about it?

So, I dismissed his advice and the nearest I ever got to the staff sports hall in the 15 years I worked at Royal was the bar. Now that I did like!

Slowly but surely I started to gain weight. By the time that I was 18 I was starting to feel fat, although I'm sure I wasn't really. So I looked at the diets in the Vogue Body & Beauty Book (also on sale from ebay for about a fiver) and the Cosmopolitan Health and Beauty Guide. I'd orginally bought these books because I was interested in make up and hair and skincare and stuff, but they had very interesting diet sections.

My diet of choice was the Helena Rubinstein "crash off 10lbs in one week" diet. Originally devised by Madame Rubinstein in 1938. The menu was more or less similar each day and was:
Breakfast - half a grapefruit and black coffee
Lunch - 1 egg, 1 slice melba toast, 1 orange
Dinner - grilled steak, lettuce, tomato, half a grapefruit

Occasionally, dinner would be eggs instead of steak.

I still have my copy of the book - pencilled in next to the daily menus, you can see my scribbles where I've "cheated". Stick of chewing gum, mushrooms and onion with the steak, ryvita instead of melba toast (which was quite a hard to find exotic food stuff back in those days in the UK!). Oh and I also had some Fresca (diet drinks had launched in the mid-70's) and a splodge of salad cream one day.

I can't remember the results I got after that week, but I can remember how bloody hungry I was all the time and how I got sick of steak. And it was the beginning of my descent into diet hell and a lifelong battle with my weight. How wise Tony Greenhalgh turned out to be - I should have just joined that staff sports club instead.

If only......

Another year over, a new one just begun.....

2009-01-01T22:04:00.004Z

Quick update on Christmas. Well, we had a nice time. Nice as in nice, not as in boring.

My roast beef Christmas lunch went very well. At the very last minute I found a meat thermometer for sale in Sainsburys so was feeling pretty confident of success with my first ever attempt at roasting a joint of meat. However, in retrospect, I feel that what I should have purchased is an oven thermometer! That damn oven of mine is SO hot! At about 45 minutes before the recommended cooking time for "medium" beef, I stuck the thermometer in to see how it was doing. "That looks done" Roy announced as he passed through the kitchen for another bottle of wine. I shushed him and told him to wait to see what the thermometer said. I was quite alarmed to see the temperature reading going up and up and up.... yes, it was done. Well done - not medium. Luckily I was able to whip it out of the oven then, while it was done but perfectly moist and not over cooked. I'll know better next time. Before and after pics are here...

Spuds with semolina? Yeah they were good. But I think they'd have been good in any case - no real need for the semolina, I don't think. That said, given that I have a huge tub of semolina (Had to buy a 3kg bag last summer just to get one tablespoon out for a crabcake recipe!) then I might as well find ways of using it up.....

New Years Eve was ok. We stayed in, ate party food and drank lots of fizz at Gary and Renee's place. Emma and Jan were there too. Roy and I left shortly after 1am - we phoned a cab thinking it would be ages before it turned up and it arrived within 10 minutes!

So here I am sitting here pondering the year ahead and feeling quite overwhelmed at the things I need to do (or want to do) and haven't yet started on. Which, of course, is the perfect excuse to procrastinate on them and not get on with it.

We're going out somewhere tomorrow. Don't know where. But just out.

What would Auntie Alice think?

2008-12-21T23:25:00.002Z

My Christmas lunch menu this year is:
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Smoked Salmon Mousse, Smoked Salmon, Soda Bread, Salad

Roast rib of Beef, Yorkshire Pudding, Stilton & Port Gravy
Roast Potatoes, Sprouts with Pancetta & Chestnuts, Mustard & Maple Roast Parsnips, Carrot & Swede Mash, Horseradish Sauce

Christmas Pudding & Cream or Brandy Sauce

Coffee, Liquers & Chocolates
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We decided to have a change from Turkey and all the trimmings. I have to confess to several things. First, I've never cooked a joint of beef before. And the one I bought is HUGE. 8lbs or more. Might not seem big to some, but for me, it's approximately 16 times bigger than the only beef I've ever cooked (steak). So, I'm seriously thinking of investing in a meat thermometer. Otherwise I'll just ruin the thing by constantly opening the oven and poking it with a huge knife.
According to Nigella (and indeed, St Delia) this size joint is going to take about 3 hours to cook, for medium. I can't cook it rare, as the in laws won't like that.

Actually, now I think of it, I've never cooked Yorkshire Puddings either, but I'll have two Mum's on hand to assist with that. Although you couldn't get two more different Yorkshire Puds than mine and Roy's mums. My mum's is cooked in a roasting pan, huge and shall we say solid in the middle. The edges rise up the pan and become light and crispy - but the centre section is like a stodgy, centimetre thick pancake (possibly like a Toad in the Hole without the Toad). Roy's mums are cooked in a bun tray, and light as a feather. I like both types - I was brought up on the stodgy version but have to admire the skill of my mother in law in making hers so light. Apparently, the secret was to let my father in law and all of their 4 sons have a good old whisk of the batter!

Second confession - many of the items on the menu will be shop bought. The smoked salmon mousse, soda bread, Carrot & Swede mash, oh - and the Christmas pudding will all be courtesy of Messrs Marks & Spencer, or Tesco.

And third, and possibly most sinful decision for this Christmas is that I am going to try sprinkling my roast potatoes with Semolina for added crunch. Now this, I have resisted for years - ever since I came across Nigella's recommendation of this method. I've transitioned from lard to olive oil to vegetable oil to goose fat over the years. In fact, I've even made no-fat roasties - that would be 1995-1997 when I was fanatical about eating less than 30% of my calorie intake as fat. But, it has to be said, the knack making of perfect roasties is a family thing that I like to think I inherited! It was taught to me by my mum, long before I ever heard of Delia or Nigella, and passed on to her by her Auntie Alice. Auntie Al was my Great Uncle Joe's wife, who sadly died very young (in her early 50's) when I was maybe 5 or 6. I remember her - but vaguely. I recall being fascinated by her as she had a jewelry collection (unusual in my family) and I think she was offering me to choose a ring - just to try on. Must ask Mum about that.

To digress from the roast potato, when she died, Uncle Joe (who my mum was really close to) gave Mum one of Alice's rings - a heavy gold Mizpah ring. I used to wear it when I was in my 20's and took it on holiday to Spain once. I managed to lose it - it came off my finger whilst I was playing in crashing waves...... Mum was not too pleased but I don't think she ever told Uncle Joe.

Anyway, back to potatoes. Mum had learned this method from her Auntie Alice and while I was growing up I knew that wherever I ate roast dinner, the spuds were NEVER as good as my Mum's. Never. So, once I moved out of home I asked her to show me how to make them (you can tell I never helped much in the kitchen when I was at home) and she did. Telling me how she'd got the method not from her Mum but from Auntie Alice. I mean, it's no big secret, and I've since read Delia who advocates pretty much the same method, but there is a lot to be said about the end result when you make your roasties this way.

Boil the potatoes (you should cut some of them lengthways if possible so that you get some nice flat sides and not just all round potatoes) in salted water.
At the same time (or preferably before) you should get your fat heating in a hot oven.

After a while, when a sharp knife just eases in to the top centimetre of the potato, drain them and stick a lid on the pan. Take a tea towel and hold the lid onto the pan and shake it vigourously, in various directions, so as to bash and roughen the edges of the potatoes - this is what gives you the crunchy exterior.

Take the fat out of the oven and tip in the potatoes from the pan, taking care to stand back and avoid splashes! Take a big spoon and baste each spud with fat. Stick them back in to the oven (on about 200) and leave them until the bottoms have gone gold-brown. Turn them, baste again and leave again. About 10 minutes before the end of cooking, tip out most of the fat - again this helps with crunchiness. I can't give precise times, the trick is to know when they are brown enough. I usually allow about 40 minutes in the oven.

So - if my potatoes are perfect - why the semolina? Well, for years I pooh poohed the goose fat trend, and then when I finally tried it, was impressed with the difference. So, having scorned the semolina idea - in my view you should not need it for crunch, if you make the potatoes properly - I do want to experiment with it.... just to prove myself right, I guess. And if I was wrong all along, well - to improve on perfection will be no big heartache for me.

As a caution, I think I'll make two trays of potatoes - one with and one without semolina. Although with a HUGE joint that is going to take hours to roast, I may not have space in the oven for all these things! Wish me luck. I will report my findings.....

Food Blog fan #1

2008-11-17T22:37:00.003Z

I've been collecting food blog links for a little while now (I guess they replaced my Cancer Website collection last year). I LOVE to read people's descriptions of the food that they cook, eat or grow... and even more so when food porn photos are involved. There are some stunning food blogs out there - in fact, they have competitions and all sorts of things that I don't really understand, but they get mentioned occasionally.

One thing I've noticed is that whenever a food blogger (and most of the sites I've seen are by women) posts a photograph of themselves up, they are invariably very slim. How?? Maybe they never eat the stuff they cook? Maybe they have incredible will power and self control. I don't know, but it fascinates me. Maybe one day I'll learn the secret.................

Evil Green & Blacks.....

2008-11-17T22:23:00.004Z

I mentioned my new G&B chocolate cookbook recently. Kate - who is Joe the lodger's girlfriend - was here last night and mentioned that she loves flapjacks. She also likes chocolate (strange is the woman who doesn't!). So I grabbed the book off the shelf and pointed at the picture above the Chocolate Flapjack recipe. "You'd like them, then" I said (trying to contain my excitement for I knew I had all the ingredients in stock). "Ooh yes they look all squidgy and yummy" says Kate (or words to that effect).

So, tonight, after dinner (Kate was here again, more on that another time, she is now our second lodger) I wandered into the kitchen to clear up. And make flapjacks. Now, I've only ever made "healthy low fat flapjacks" before and to be honest they're a waste of time - they pretty much crumbled as soon as they came out of the tray. So this time, I meant business - I mean, 350g of butter?? This is most definitely NOT a healthy recipe. But it is so easy.

Melt 350g of butter with 6oz muscovado sugar and 60z soft brown sugar in a pan along with 3 tbsps of golden syrup. (Actually I only had 150g of butter and so made up the balance with Flora Buttery - my nod to healthy eating). Once they are all melted and combined, throw in 450g of oats (I used 200g of extra special large oats, that I buy in to make Granola and 250g of regular Scotts porridge oats) and 6 tablespoons of cocoa powder. Green & Blacks, naturally. Mix it all well and then pour into a baking tray - I lined mine with greaseproof paper to avoid knife marks when cutting. Bake at 140 for 18-20 minutes. Cool for 20 minutes. Cut into about 20 squares. Wait until completely cold until removing from tray. This last bit is difficult... you just want to dive in and eat them, but they fall to pieces until completely cooled. I put mine into the garage to speed up the cooling process...... There is, I have discovered, no instant gratification to be had when making flapjacks. Not even a trace of cake batter to feast on whilst waiting for the finished baked item.

A modification suggested in the book is to add dessicated coconut and I'd have loved to, but Joe the lodger is allergic to coconut and so I decided it would be mean to make a tray of flapjacks that he couldn't eat. This boy, on arriving here in October, told me he didn't really have a sweet tooth - interesting then that he has wolfed down every sugar laden treat I've cooked up since then!!!

So, we finally got to taste these flapjacks at about 9pm. Roy declared them to be "Stunning, better than the muffins". Kate said "oh yes they were all soft inside" (she must like this in a flapjack. I liked them too. Oh Evil Green & Blacks, what have you done to me!

I said to my sister by text tonight that since Joe arrived I'm turning into Aunt Flipping Bessie! She replied that I love it really. And I think I do!

Oh, I will try to put up a pic of the flapjacks tomorrow....

The wonders of baking

2008-11-11T12:35:00.002Z

One of my favourite things in the whole world (well the world of food) is a Millie's Muffin.
http://www.milliescookies.com/products/muffins.php
The Chocolate Chunk version, to be precise. I've occasionally strayed and bought Cappucino, but the Chocolate Chunk remains my preference. It has become a tradition, when travelling, for Roy and I to celebrate the start of our holiday with a Millie's Muffin and coffee at the airport. They're £1.89 each now. I can remember the time (around 5 years ago) when you could get a Muffin and a coffee for £1.10 as a special promotion. Actually when trawling that website for information, I noticed that the calorie content of these muffins is HORRENDOUS! No wonder I never want to eat anything else all day when I've had one. They come in at around 760 calories! I am pleased to say that the Chocolate Chunk is not quite the highest calorie version - that honour goes to the Double Chocolate at a whopping 780 calories. I wish I'd never looked....

After dinner this evening, I mentioned to Roy that I had an urge to make White Chocolate & Blueberry muffins. This is a recipe I tested, and loved, when my niece Emily was staying with us last summer. In fact, it's about the closest in texture to a Millie's muffin that I've ever baked. It's that fantastic combination of crusty top and soft interior that I like. Of course, my baking urge was in part due to the niggling in my brain telling me "you still have one more bar of Green & Blacks in the fridge". Needless to say, the two bars of Butterscotch had well disappeared, but the white chocolate was sitting there, waiting to be used. I'd originally earmarked it for a duo of chocolate pots (recipe from the G&B book) but then the muffin idea took hold.

It is amazing how quickly you can conjure up a batch of 14 muffins! I got the urge just after 7pm and before 8, there they were - ready to eat, still slightly warm from the oven. And they were as good as I remembered. The only problem is that the top goes soft over night - you just can't retain that fresh from the oven crust. But still pretty good the next day. And the day after that......

Baking is magical.. I know it's a science and so on, but it never ceases to amaze me how people figured it all out... how the combination of some wet and dry stuff can produce instant comfort on a plate.

Sunday 9th November

2008-11-09T20:09:00.004Z

No idea what to call this blog, so have just dated it.

It is a miserable, cold, windy and rainy day - so the walk to Temple Newsam did not happen. Instead I pottered around at home. My one achievement? Making dumplings for the first time ever! I did a beef stew and dumplings for dinner. Thanks to Jamie Oliver - I followed (more or less) the recipe from Ministry of Food. I actually have purchased this book as one of Roy's Christmas presents but on leafing through it realised that in all my 40-odd years, I have never made dumplings and the recipe was there, so....

They were pretty easy actually and turned out well. As did the stew.

I also found a huge butternut squash in the garage and because I could not recall exactly how long it had been there (it looked ok) I decided to roast it and then I stood pondering over over to do with the pulp. Eventually I plumped for a butternut squash soup, with a base of onion, garlic and veg stock and spiced up with cayenne pepper and ginger. It is pretty good actually. I'll freeze some and use the rest tomorrow evening.

Still on the topic of food, in Tesco yesterday they were offering a "free" Green & Blacks chocolate recipe book when you purchased three bars of G&B chocolate. I needed no encouragement. I left with 2 bars of butterscotch choc and a bar of white choc (having stocked up on 70% dark choc last week) and my lovely new recipe book. And it is very lovely - there are some fabulous recipes and ideas in there. I can't wait to try some.

I just realised that I haven't yet updated about my lodger! Since early October, we've had my nephew Joe living with us. He's studying at Leeds Uni until the end of this year, and with it only being a sort term placement there, there wasn't much point in him finding accomodation elsewhere. We've enjoyed having him here - his girlfriend Kate is also in Leeds (but living in a shared student flat) and she is here quite a lot too. It's been fun playing surrogate parents! And probably one of the things that prompted back in to the kitchen and my recipe books...

Autumn is well and truly here

2008-11-08T16:57:00.002Z

So now it is dark by 5pm and the trees are absolutely stunning this year. I don't know if it is because we had such a wet summer but the colours are incredible and the leaves seem to be sticking on the trees for a long time. The reds, golds, ambers, russets and browns are beautiful. I might venture down to Temple Newsam tomorrow to see what kind of display the trees there are putting on.

Mum has finally had her nose job. She had a basal cell carcinoma (which sounds more alarming than it apparently is) which was mis-diagnosed for many years and therefore being wrongly treated with creams and antibiotics. Finally, it was recognised as a rodent ulcer - the non technical name for it - and she was referred to a specialist. Removing these growth is supposed to be straightforward. You may recall that the removal was supposed to happen last June - on the day dad died - but was cancelled because mum's heart rate was erratic and because the numbing agent contains adrenaline they did not want to go ahead. So, after a long process of referral back to her heart specialist, waiting for cardioversion to correct the heart rate, and waiting again for skin specialist referral - she finally had the ulcer removed this week.

All went well - they did not use a general anaesthetic - but my god her face is a mess! She looks like she has been badly beaten up. This is due to the fact that at the same time as the ulcer is removed a skin graft is taken to cover over the area. The graft was taken from her cheek. It's all very clever, and I am sure it will look great when it has healed but for now it is pretty horrible. Underneath mum's eye is bruised and puffy and she has two big lines of stitches on her face. And through all this she's been terrific - in fact the only thing she's bothered about is having the stitches removed!

The recent cook fest went well. The mushroom risotto was excellent and I will definitely remake. The sticky stuff for the binfire party went down a treat - they'll be repeated too. Salmon fishcakes were also good - and I also made a Nigella chocolate cake which includes half a jar of marmelade - I'd forgotten all about this one, but found the recipe again when I was leafing through "Domestic Goddess". I LOVE the Nigella Christmas book - it's fabulous and there are lots of recipes in there that I intend to try. When I do I need to try to take some pictures - not that I'd ever compete with some of the fantastic food blogs out there.........

Brrrrrr.....

2008-10-29T19:17:00.004Z

Did I say it was sunny and warm three days ago? Scrap that - it is now freezing cold and parts of the UK have had snow!

So, my cookfest will continue shortly with:
Mushroom Risotto
Salmon and Broccoli fishcakes
Sticky Gingerbread
Sticky Toffee Pudding
Sticky Sausages

I realise that there is a lot of stickiness going on, but it is that time of year!

The risotto and fishcakes I want to try and happen to have the ingredients for - might make them tomorrow. The rest are for a binfire party on Saturday night.

And the great news is that my new Nigella book arrived (the Christmas one) this week so I've been earmarking some other things to try. I'm definitely going to have a go at chilli jam. And I'll probably remake the grotesque sounding but really yummy choc, prune and tia maria fruit cake.

Ok, I'm off to check my stocks of sugar and dates.....

Martha or Maxine?

2008-10-27T13:01:00.002Z

Martha or Maxine?
Martha:
Stuff a miniature marshmallow in the bottom of an ice cream cone to prevent ice cream drips.
Maxine:
Just suck the ice cream out of the bottom of the cone, for Pete's sake! You are probably lying on the couch with your feet up eating it, anyway!

Martha:
To keep potatoes from budding, place an apple in the bag with the potatoes.
Maxine:
Buy Hungry Jack mashed potato mix. Keeps in the pantry for up to a year.

Martha:
When a cake recipe calls for flouring the baking pan, use a bit of the dry cake mix instead and there won't be any white mess on the outside of the cake.
Maxine:
Go to the bakery! Hell, they'll even decorate it for you!

Martha:
If you accidentally over-salt a dish while it's still cooking, drop in a peeled potato and it will absorb the excess salt for an instant 'fix-me-up.'
Maxine:
If you over-salt a dish while you are cooking, that's too bad. Please recite with me the real woman's motto: 'I made it, you will eat it and I don't care how bad it tastes!'

Martha:
Wrap celery in aluminum foil when putting in the refrigerator and it will keep for weeks.
Maxine:
Celery? Never heard of it!

Martha:
Brush some beaten egg white over pie crust before baking to yield a beautiful glossy finish.
Maxine:
The Mrs. Smith frozen pie directions do not include brushing egg whites over the crust, so I don't.

Martha:
Cure for headaches: take a lime, cut it in half and rub it on your forehead. The throbbing will go away.
Maxine:
Take a lime, mix it with tequila, chill and drink! All your pains go away!

Martha:
If you have a problem opening jars, try using latex dish washing gloves. They give a non-slip grip that makes opening jars easy.
Maxine:
Go ask that very cute neighbor if he can open it for you.

Martha:
Don't throw out all that leftover wine. Freeze into ice cubes for future use in casseroles and sauces.
Maxine:
Leftover wine??????????? HELLO!!!!!!!

A friend sent this to me. I was reading it, laughing and then thought about the left over egg whites and wine in my freezer, and the fact that I reaching for a pen to jot down the tips about lime for headaches and potato to mop up excess salt..... hmmm.... I am most definitely a Martha!

Soup season, with carrot muffins thrown in for good measure

2008-10-27T12:38:00.003Z

It is getting to the time of year when I like to make (and eat) soup. Mind you, it is so sunny and mild outside today, I feel a bit of a fraud saying that!

I decided yesterday to make a pan of my favourite "healthy, tasty, warming" soup - Lentil & Carrot - but I ran out of time (and energy) having made a batch of granola, cooked a roast dinner, done some shopping, taken Mum home etc. etc.

So this morning, I got into gear. The lentil and carrot soup is SO easy.
Chop a large onion, 2 sticks of celery, 2 carrots into a pan - saute in a little olive oil for about 15 minutes. Don't forget to drop in the leaves from the top of the celery (assuming that you don't buy those soul-less neat little packages of celery hearts).
Rinse about a mug ful of red lentils in cold water. Add to the pan. Top up with approximately 1 litre of veg stock and simmer until the lentils are cooked and the veggies are soft. If you think it's getting a bit dry during cooking add a splash of water. Season with pepper. Blitz with a stick blender until you get the consistency you like. My preference is for the odd chunk of veg to be left in.

This freezes ok, too.

So, whilst cooking the soup, I remembered having some left over (cooked) cauliflower in the fridge from yesterday. Being a Martha and not a Maxine (I will clarify that on a later blog) I keep this sort of stuff! I decided to make a cauliflower and cheddar soup out of that - just one portion, for me, for lunch. I chopped half an onion, 2 small new potatoes and 1 stick of celery into a pan. Sauteed in a little oil. Added the cooked cauli and about a pint (maybe just under) of veg stock. Simmered until all the veg was soft. Blitzed it up with a dash of double cream (also left over from yesterday) and decided that this was just SO good it did not need the cheddar adding.

I think I'll "plan" to have left over veggies every Sunday in future. A bit of stock and a tiny splash of cream can transform them in to the most wonderful soup.

And finally, while I was in the kitchen, I decided to try out my new silicone cupcake cups! I had a recipe from a supermarket magazine for Carrot Cupcakes. They are very tasty indeed - I've eaten one, and plan to freeze the rest for an easy "on the run" breakfast. And fairly healthy - they are made with wholemeal flour, raisins, carrots, apricots, seeds. I guess the bad bit is the sugar and to be honest, you could easily halve the amount and still have a great tasting muffin.

Dreaming of Dad

2008-10-20T08:35:00.000+01:00

Well it has been one year and 4 months since Dad passed and in that time I've never dreamed of him. On Sunday night I did. I recall seeing him come toward me and he gave me a big hug. It was lovely - he looked, felt and smelled like my Dad. In good health. And then he took my hands and was holding both of them and looking into my face and smiling at me.
His eyes were that beautiful deep "Alman Blue". We didn't really speak, I think I was trying to speak to him but couldn't and I don't remember him answering.

I woke up feeling nice about it.

But now I'm wondering why he came to me?

Nothing to blog about?

2008-06-10T19:04:00.006+01:00

On 6th April I wrote this:
I have yet to report on our recent trips to Horsham, Maidstone and Canterbury
and I didn't ever blog those trips. Since then, we've had little jaunts to:
Dundee and Swindon
and I haven't written those up either.

I doubt I'll get round to it now. Suffice to say, all of those trips were excellent, revolved around my work and contained lots of driving and a fresh appreciation of how diverse and beautiful Britain can be. Especially when the sun shines, as it did for a lot of the time we were away.

Ok, patriotic bit over.

June has been manic, work wise. I found myself out on business every single day - except for two days this week Wednesday and Friday when I have full days "in the office". It's been good though. Seeing lots of different places, lots of the same motorway and a few nice hotels.

On Thursday this week I'm going over to mum's after work. Lorraine, Mum and I are going out. On Friday, we're visiting the graveyard, as it will be one year since Dad died. The year has gone over so quickly and I feel as if so much has happened since - what with mum's house move, changing jobs, South Africa, Roy's work situation etc.

So I did have a lot to blog about, (the travels) but I never got round to it and I'm fed up playing catch up.

Next scheduled trip is 12th July when we'll celebrate our third wedding anniversary (belatedly, it's on the 1st July) with a stay at the Pheasant Inn in Chester. I think we're also going to Chester Races on that day, too.

In memory of Frank Scott - 6th June 2008

2008-06-10T19:01:00.002+01:00

My cousin Frank passed away on Friday 6th June. He had been ill for a little while and was not able to have the surgery that might have saved his life.

Frank lived on the Isle of Man and in my younger years I would visit him there a lot, with my other cousin, his sister Joan. I haven't seen too much of Frank in recent years.

He leaves a widow and two daughters.

Rest in peace, Frank.

In memory of Barry Alman - 18.5.2008

2008-06-01T20:22:00.003+01:00

Just over a week after we returned from South Africa, we had a call to give us some very sad news. My cousin, Barry (who had been ill while we were staying in SA) had passed away.

I hope that Barry is resting peacefully. We never got to see him when we were there, but I met Barry years ago at my parents, when he was living in the UK.

On 26th May (the day of his memorial services) we laid family flowers at Goodison Park football ground in Barry's memory.

South Africa Holiday - the end!

2008-06-01T20:06:00.003+01:00

So I've been bringing my SA blog up to date and now it is finished. I am sure there is tons of stuff I missed.

I do love Africa. I also find it a very strange place - full of contradiction. There is so much beauty (the land and the people) and also so much brutality. I also find that I am drawn to politically "interesting" places like SA and Cuba. It makes me think. And that can only be good, hey?

Now that is a real South African-ism. Adding "hey" in a questioning manner at the end of sentences or statements. I am trying not to copy it in everyday speech, because it irritates Roy when I do!

Other things they say are "oh shame" all the time. And not only if you're telling them about some mishap or unfortunate incident. And "is it?". Another question, but not always used in that context, or "correctly". I'm trying to think of an example. Here's one.

Me: "We're going to Durban next week".
South African person: "Is it?".

The one I like is "we'll make a plan". This is said all the time - and sounds really grand and formal, but can be as simple as "Let's have coffee. We'll make a plan and meet up". I love that one!

And "ja" is used a lot instead of yes, even by non-Afrikaners, I think.

Finally, "just now" is a commonly used phrase. As in "we'll see you just now". With "just now" meaning any length of time - not immediately. Actually, they use this in Scotland a lot, too.

My personal favourite expression was one often used by Korbie, the Afrikaans lady who we met on safari with her British husband, Brian. As we drove around, Brian would often point out birds to her. She was a very calm, relaxed lady. Slowly, she'd raise her binoculars to her eyes, look at the bird and gently sigh out "Stunning". With absolutely no enthusiasm whatsoever! It was so funny. "Stunning" became one of the catch phrases of our trip, thereafter.

I think I went to SA thinking that it would be a good place to live in. I've changed my views about that, largely due to the political situation and also the crime rates. I think it would be nigh on impossible for a white couple like us to emigrate there now - unless of course we had our own business and were self sufficient. I don't think immigrants are wanted. The government is trying hard to rebalance things (racially) and opportunity is granted only to some.

Many parents are actively encouraging their kids to get qualified and then get out of the country. SA is losing talented people to the UK, Australia and New Zealand. It's so sad.

I guess I had in mind that things were on the way to being "mended" now, post apartheid, but the truth is that they are nowhere near resolved. There is a long, long way to go - and I don't quite know how it will all work out in the end.

But I'll be back. Definitely.

The last day - going home, and one final palaver

2008-05-07T19:16:00.002+01:00

I just missed my last sunrise by 10 minutes. Shame. By the time I wandered in to the lounge at 6.25am the sun was casting a gorgeous red/orange glow into the room. I couldn't get back to sleep so I stayed up. G&M had to pop out to sort something out with the bakkie, and Gail arrived to see us before we left.

It was a beautiful, hot sunny day. We had breakfast and then sat in the garden chatting all morning, interspersed with bits of packing here and there. I am determined not to exceed the luggage allowance of 20kg each, and so I'm throwing away all sorts of clothes that we won't use again and leaving all my leftover sunscreen etc. with the family!

Before we left I gave Dad's little journal of his time in SA to Margaret, and asked her to pass it on to Gordon. I didn't want to give it to him directly as I thought it might all get a bit emotional.

We left the house at about 2pm for the airport. We had a clear run and G&M parked up and came in to see us off after check in. However, we encountered a big problem at check in. Whilst we had paperwork confirming our South African Airways (SAA) flights from Durban to Jo'burg and then on to Heathrow, the BMI agent who booked the flights for me had not properly ticketed them - so the check in girl was missing a ticket code for the DUR-JNB leg. Without it, she could not issue us boarding cards. She'd already tagged the luggage and sent it through.

After much faffing, she came back from the SAA office and said her manager was dealing with it and was trying to contact London to get the code. In the meantime we'd have to wait. The next update we got was when she told us that is was "highly unlikely" we'd be on our flight to Joburg (due to leave at 15.40). But that she'd be able to put us on the 16.40 (provided that London sorted the references out) and we'd still make our Heathrow connection. In the meantime she was going to have our luggage taken off the flight and brought back round to check in.

Ok, we sat and waited. Time marched on (we'd told G&M to go before the traffic out of Durban built up) and still no answer... then I saw a guy bring a piece of paper to her and say "this is what you need". So I assumed she'd be calling us over soon. She didn't. Instead, she disappeared for a very long time and was last spotted hovering at the stand by desk. Maybe the flight was full and she was struggling to find 2 seats for us? It was by now 10 minutes before the 16.40 flight was due to close and I was getting really anxious. I went looking for the check in girl and found her in a small office near the main SAA offices. She looked at me and said "Oh". I said that the 16.40 flight was about to close and what was happening.... another girl dragged her away by the hand and they were giving each other sly looks!! She turned and said to me "I promise you'll be on that flight". NOW I was getting worried.

I went back to Roy, who was waiting by the check in desk. She came back and started to check us in, but was making a complete hash of it. Eventually her supervisor came along and helped out but I could not relax until I'd seen those boarding cards print out! Just at the last minute, I noticed our cases trundling away on the conveyor belt with JNB labels on them. I asked her "have you checked those bags through to Heathrow?". She said "Oh shit" (no kidding) and ran after them to put the proper LHR labels on. I guess the only good news about today was that our bags weighed in spot on 40kgs!

So we then hot footed it through security and pretty much straight on to the flight. We weren't sitting together but it was only an hour flight so not too bad. I read the in flight mag, had a much needed glass of white wine and watched my last African sunset just as we landed in Johannesburg. A perfect red ball falling below the arc of the earth. Wow.

Joburg Airport is hideous (think Heathrow but with hustler) and we had our last tourist sting of the holiday happen! Our own faults for standing about looking confused as to how to get to International Departures. A smartly dressed guy came and asked what we were looking for and before we knew it was showing us the way and politely demanding a "nice tip" for his trouble!

Ah well... soon enough we were in the Baobab lounge and relaxing for a short while. Unfortunately we missed the early boarding call for Business Class passengers and ended up in a HUGE queue to board the flight.

We ate dinner and then tried to sleep. It was SO hot though, and I did not sleep well. Watched a movie (Juno) and tried to sleep again. Not much joy. I thought the drama of today might have exhausted us!

We landed on time and had enough time (but not much spare) to collect our bags and get through to the domestic terminal. The walk to baggage collection was about 3 miles long. Don't you just love international airports? I was a bit worried about whether our bags would actually have made it through - the one place you don't want your bags going missing is Joburg! Most of the SA passengers seemed to have their suitcases shrinkwrapped in cellophane for security reasons!

So we stood at the carousel and waited. And waited. And waited some more. Ever the voice of doom, Roy decided that our bags were lost. But then, just as we'd given up hope, out they came. Leaving us now quite short on time to make the connection, and we were tired and irritable. So getting to domestic check in, we thought it would be quick and easy as we'd checked in online and printed boarding passes at Margarets the day before. But a nice "jobsworth" security man was determined to hold us up (he'd seen us trying to sneak through a "no entry" section of the BMI area) and made us go to a separate set of scales to have our luggage weighed. When we got there, the woman looked at us and said "why are you hear, just go to the bag drop". We explained that we'd been trying to but got stopped. Grrrrr... as we passed the guy again he just smirked at us.

So finally we were in Leeds. We booked a taxi and were home at last.

The end.

Battlefields - Day 2 (with a mini drama included)

2008-05-06T16:51:00.000+01:00

It is our last full day in South Africa. Who needs an alarm clock when there are hadeha birds around? Not us. We woke at 6. We'd been told that breakfast would be served at 8 so we packed our bags and took a quick stroll around the gardens. There is a memorial to Foy's wife in the garden, which is very touching.

I have to say that if you are looking at the pics of the bedrooms on the Penny Farthing website, they seem a bit old fashioned and dreary. They actually are incredibly comfortable and much nicer than they look on the site!

Breakfast for us was cereal, papaya and toast. We haven't really been eating cooked breakfasts - which is probably just as well, given some of the evening meals we've indulged in!

Foy told us that we would be driving our own car on the tour and so with him (and our heavy case) in the back, we set off down the dirt track. We dared not to criticise it as Foy proudly told us he'd built it all himself when he was a young man. As we went over the first big bump (there are lots of them - water pipes I assume) I felt the underneath of Gordon's car scrape the ground. I was very nervous that we'd wreck his car. I think the combined weight of Roy, myself, Foy (a big man) and the suitcase was a tad too much!

Back on the main road, I breathed a sigh of relief, until a few minutes later when Foy instructed me to turn left onto another dusty, stony track! There were chips flying up everywheree. Foy advised me to stay above 60kms per hour to "even out" the road. Actually, it works. Wish I'd learned this tip earlier in our holiday!

First, we stopped at Rorke's Drift. This is the scene of the film Zulu and Foy gave us a very detailed overview (using a scale model of the area) of the battles of Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift, and also what had happened at Fugitive's Drift. We then went to the rebuilt hospital at Rorke's Drift, where Foy gave us chapter and verse of that battle and how the 100+ English fought off 4000 Zulu Warriors. Fascinating. Details here, if you want them:
http://battlefields.kzn.org.za/battlefields/about/192.xml

Next, we drove across the Buffalo River to Isandlwana Hill. This, I think, is the most poignant battlefield of all. So many men killed in such a short space of time. Standing on a slope overlooking the hill and the battlefield below it, the sense of history is incredible. And just to see all the white stones marking mass graves makes you sad, and for the pacifists among us, also a bit angry at the waste of young lives.

Foy told us the story of the battle - all 1.5 hours of it - and then we headed back to Penny Farthing where we ate a picnic lunch before heading home. We were on the road by 2.30 - well in time to reach G&M's before dark.

We'd consulted with G before we set off and he'd recommended that we should NOT take the R33 route via Greytown. We checked our maps, and realised that to go back the way we came (via Dundee and Ladysmith) would add about 100kms to the trip. Ann had warned us off the R33 too - she said "I wouldn't use it, and I live here". Foy, however, was insistent that we use it - "You'll get to see proper rural Africa, Zulu villages and farms. You'll be fine, and it is a beautiful drive". Ann's final comment on the matter: "It's ok for him to say that - he speaks fluent Zulu so if he broke down in the middle of nowhere, he'd be fine".

What did we do? We took the R33 of course. Tempted by the shorter trip, and the promise of beautiful valleys and hills. We'd asked Foy if there were gas stations along the way. Oh yes, he'd said, you can fill up at Greytown - 100kms from Penny Farthing. Roy asked me on the way back from the Battlefields how much petrol we had left. I told him a quarter tank. Foy said that would be plenty to get us to Greytown.

So, with Roy driving, we were about 10kms from the house, when he challenged me on the petrol situation. "This is nowhere near a quarter tank" he said. Hmm. "Well I'm sure it was when I looked". So now we have a problem. We are effectively in the middle of nowhere and we have insufficient petrol to take us 100kms to Greytown. We have no idea where the nearest gas station is. But we know we're about to hit a town called Pomeroy, so there was bound to be some petrol there, wasn't there?

Actually - no, there wasn't. We did find a gas station and pulled in to find a queue of trucks there. Most of them brimming with workers, hanging out of every available inch of truck! Sitting in the front of our little Mazda 3, GPS in one hand, wallet in the other, camera round my neck and with two mobile phones in my lap - I started to feel that I was the focal point of every pair of eyes within 20 metres and ever so slightly uncomfortable. Then I noticed a sign saying "Diesel". I said to Roy that this was a diesel only station and so we had to drive off. Where is the next place? According to our map it was Tugela Ferry, I couldn't work out the distance, but it's a lot nearer than Greytown. I also couldn't tell how big a place it was.

So we climbed up some hills - Roy was coasting down them and the anxiety of not knowing if we would make it to a gas station was really spoiling our enjoyment of the fantastic scenery! I was silently trying to figure out a contingency plan if we did run out of fuel in the countryside. I didn't really have one. It was not a good time for Roy to advise me that the Fuel Warning indicator light had just come on.

Eventually, I started to notice the familiar "taxis" along the route. Not many of them, but I saw at least one white minibus pull in to drop somebody off. Ah ha, here is contingency. If we break down, we'll have to stand on the road, hail a taxi, get to Greytown, buy a can of fuel and get a taxi back to the car. Hardly ideal (and would probably take HOURS) but at least there is some sort of plan there.......

As we coasted down a really big hill, we started to see signs of Tugela Ferry in the distance. Oh - good news - it was looking like a fairly big place, and not just houses - some industrial looking buildings too. Surely there would be petrol here? Down and down the hill we dropped, and then all of a sudden, we hit a traffic jam! As we crawled round a bend, the anticipation was excruciating... finally we could see the main drag of the road as it went through town, but there were no gas station signs. Not one. Oh dear. We saw cafes, restaurants, shops - surely there is petrol here? Another bend in the road, and this time, as we came off it, there it was, in all it's red and yellow glory: SHELL. Ahhhhh... BIG sigh of relief, a bit of cheering and air punching and in we drove.

This was the best petrol station I've ever seen! Not only were there goats and chickens running around all over the forecourt, but there were ladies selling fruit and veg and all kinds of stuff along the edges and all along the roadside. Roy got out. Getting out of your car at the gas station here is totally unnecessary. In fact, filling up is a great experience because somebody comes and does it all for you. And while the tank is filling, they wash all the windscreens and wing mirrors too. All for a small (R5-R7) tip. I wish we had that in Britain! But he'd decided to get out and stretch his legs and chat to the attendant. I could hear him lying. "We're very tired, we've just driven from Johannesburg", he fibbed. What was all that about? According to Roy, he felt unsafe here (well, Ann had spent a while telling us how evil Tugela Ferry was) and so he'd decided that the best defence was to get out and be friendly and also go for the sympathy vote by claiming to be on a long road trip. Whatever!

In actual fact, we were merely a curiosity in Tugela Ferry. Lots of folk wandered past and peered into the car, but then just smiled, waved and passed on by. To be the only white faces in a town which clearly gets very few tourists, did not mean that we were threatened at all - just a novelty. The attendant came round to my door to chat to me. Actually, this was a feeble attempt at getting money. She told me that she'd heard we were flying to England tomorrow (Roy must have filled her in on our travel plans). Oh, she said, she'd LOVE to fly to England, but she had no money. She didn't quite have her hand stretched out toward me but the implication was clear. Well we could always swap, I said. You have my ticket and I'll stay here? She burst out laughing and wandered off.

So, with a full tank and peace of mind we left Tugela Ferry. NOW we could enjoy the stunning surrounds of the hills and valleys. Now we could marvel at the sheer number of people walking on the roads. I think school was just out so we were waved at by dozens of happy looking kids. Now we could appreciate how interesting the landscape was, and try to spot the "hills that look like elephants" that Foy had mentioned to us.

Women carry babies on their persons wrapped in towels. Around the waist, around their back. Sometimes more than one. And many women have umbrellas up to shade their heads from the sun. We also saw some people carrying goods on their heads - first time we'd seen this in southern Africa. And women gather reeds along the road - presumably for thatching, as a lot of the houses here are thatched roofs.

It was a beautiful drive down to Pietermaritzburg, where we picked up the N3 motorway. At times, it looked and felt like England. But soon we knew we were in Africa as we saw the sun setting over the hills behind us. We drove into G&M's drive at 5.40 - good timing! Had a quick chat and then got showered and changed as we're taking G&M out for dinner tonight.

We went to La Strada - an Italian in Hillcrest, about 10 mins drive away. I drove tonight.
http://www.restaurants.co.za/details.asp?resId=3976

We shared a pizza bread with various cheeses (including Gorgonzola) on top. It was delicious. Then we all had Fillet steak (apart from Gordon who had a chicken salad) and that was also excellent. Then home, for coffee and a chat. We had a VERY late night tonight - 11pm.

Battlefields - Day 1

2008-05-05T16:25:00.003+01:00

We woke at 6.15am to............ sunshine! Please let it stay sunny.
We had breakfast with Gail and then left her place at around 9.30 to drive into the Battlefields area where we are spending the next 2 days. This part of the trip was organised, booked and paid for by G&M but as I explained they are now unable to join us.

Our first stop was Spionkop. This was the site of a British defeat by the Boers in January 1900.
http://battlefields.kzn.org.za/battlefields/about/191.xml
What struck me most was that it is a very beautiful place, and somehow you can't imagine it being a place to fight. There are 360 degree views from the top of the hill - and it is such a clear day we can see along the entire Drakensberg range. Stunning.
We had Spionkop to ourselves, there was nobody else around at all. You can drive right to the top of the hill (yay, no walking!) and then do a self guided trail. It is interesting and also very sad - to see all those graves (mostly mass grave sites) and read how young most of the men were.

I also find it strange that this particular battle was between the Boers and the British - both fighting over something that didn't belong to either of them!

The famous "Kop" stand at Anfield is named after Spionkop, in tribute to the many local people who fell at this battle (the West Lancashire regiment had a large presence there). I only learned this recently! But luckily before we travelled to SA.

So after leaving Spionkop (along a 7km dusty dirt track, of course) we drove through Ladysmith, and had planned to stop there. We decided against this as there was no parking near the museum (which specialises in the Battlefields story) and there didn't seem to be many tourists around... just a working town. We drove through Glencoe and Dundee - where we stopped to get a sandwich at Pick n Pay - and parked up just out of Dundee to eat lunch. Lunch included the biggest custard slice I've ever seen in my life. But we did share it!

Our B&B - Penny Farthing - was about 30kms past Dundee and we arrived there just after 2. Penny Farthing is a lovely property in the middle of nowhere - 2/3kms along a dirt track off the main road - and we were greeted by three dogs barking excitedly as we opened the car doors. It was only 2 days later, back at G&Ms, that we realised one of the dogs had badly scratched the passenger door!

http://www.pennyf.co.za/index.htm

Ann, the housekeeper, greeted us and showed us to our room. It was lovely, and as it was still hot and sunny, we had a little walk round the gardens and sat by the pool to read for a short while. Everywhere we went we were followed by the dogs!
Roy wasn't feeling so good so he had a lie down and then we went out for another walk, venturing further out into the open farmland. It really is tranquil and beautiful here. Foy, the owner and our Battlefield guide for tomorrow, dropped some reading material in at our room and said he would see us at dinner.

We had drinks at 6.30pm and then we all sat down to eat. Dinner is a communal affair with all guests eating with Ann and Foy. Ann is the cook (although she does have a lot of help) but eats very little as she says she would get too fat if she ate the meals she cooked every night. I was starting to suffer with dog allergies as those dogs have the run of the house, including the dining area. But they are nice dogs! The only other guests are a Dutch couple, and they are not on the tour with Foy tomorrow. In fact, it looks like we'll have him to ourselves.
Dinner: Mushroom soup (delicious!) with croutons/ Lamb, sweet potato, broccoli, samp & beans, carrots, cauli, gravy/Strawberry cheesecake and ice cream.

Now, Margaret has been worrying about us driving after dark here. And so she asked us to speak with Foy to make sure that he would have us back off the tour in time for daylight driving. It is a good 3-4 hours back to Durban and sunset is now shortly before 6pm. So he agreed, and said that to "save time" in the morning, we would watch a video whilst having after dinner coffee. The idea is that he gives a lot of background info to the Anglo-Zulu War before the tour commences.

We all went through to the lounge. About 5 minutes into the first film, the dutch lady was fast asleep! I had the "fidgets" and could not keep still. I went to take an antihistamine and came back to the lounge. The film ended and I thought "oh great - bedtime". Foy came back in. Instead of wishing us good night, he put another video in the machine. We watched that. Surely now we can sleep? Not quite. He then came back in and said he would do our "orientation"! This consisted of him telling us where the Boers, Zulus and English were coming from in the months leading up to the Zulu War. So all incredibly interesting, but I'm sure I'll have forgotten everything by tomorrow!

It is a chilly night - the fire has been burning since 6 - but we have electric blankets and sleep well.

Sani - the Pass to surpass all Passes

2008-05-04T15:29:00.002+01:00

As you may have read we've driven a LOT of mountain passes in the last 3 weeks. And loved pretty much every single one of them, even the ones we've moaned about. So today we're heading up the Sani Pass. This time it's different - we will not be self driving this one. The state of the roads and the steep, sharp bends near the top, mean that this one is best left to the experts.

Woke just before 7. It is windy and cloudy. It is Autumn here and I'm totally discombobulated. All around us are the beautiful colours of Autumn - red, gold and brown trees. And yet back home, the trees are just starting to bud (or where when we came away) and everything will by now have turned to green.

We got up out of bed when our coffee and wake up call arrived at 7.30am. Oh - and the extremely tasty home made biscotti! No sooner had we finished that, it was time for breakfast! We wanted to eat early-ish and then take a stroll. The food, as expected, was lovely. With light as a feather home made scones being the crowning glory on the buffet table. I also had some poached eggs.

Walking around the dam, we stopped to watch two herons fighting over domination of a tree and a small island in the lake. One of them eventually managed to harangue the other one off his patch!

We checked out, paid up, chatted with the owner and receptionist, complimenting them on their hotel. They told us we have to come back! I'd love to. In fact, they've even told us the best room to ask for! Funny, but I already thought we had the best room.....

Then we wandered outside to wait for our car to take us up the Sani Pass. It didn't seem as if any of the other guests in the hotel were on the same trip as nobody else was waiting. We'd been told that the driver would be there between 9.30 and 9.45. We'd filled in all our passport/border control forms.... the other exciting thing about Sani Pass is that it actually takes you from South Africa, across the border into Lesotho, an independent Kingdom.

It was almost 10 before a 4WD with "Sani Pass Tours" pulled up into the hotel drive. As the driver got out we strolled toward him and introduced ourselves. He looked at us blankly. "Sorry, I don't have any tours booked today, who did you book with?".
I explained that we made our booking via the hotel. He asked us to wait and said he'd go and have a word with the hotel people. He came back out and explained that there had been a mix up (we'd gathered that already). I'd actually changed the date of our hotel reservation (and the Sani tour) before we came out here, and unfortunately the hotel had forgotten to let him know. As far as he knew we were not due to do the trip until the next day!
But, no matter. He jumped in his car, told us to get in (apologising he'd not had chance to clean it out) handed us a "Birds of the Sani Pass" laminate and set off driving. On the way, he started telling us all about the history of the road leading into Lesotho.
http://www.sanitours.co.za/default.htm

On the way to the Pass, we saw basotho people, wrapped in brightly coloured woollen blankets, leading some horses down the road. Our guide explained that they come down to trade things, look for work or steal cattle and other animals.

Soon after, our guide took a phone call and explained that there was another car from his tour company only 5/10 minutes ahead of us, so if we didn't mind, we would be joining that tour. No problem. I was glad that he'd got his day back! Soon after we were with Viv, our new guide and Muriel - a Swiss lady who was the only other person on the trip. And off we went - up the Pass.

Sani Pass is without question the most horrendous road I've ever travelled on. The rocks, stones, water and potholes cover 100% of it. Having done the trip, I don't think I'd have been scared of self driving (in the right car!) but I don't think it would particularly enjoyable - it just takes far too long. And the concentration required would make that hard work. It takes over 3 hours to get up (including a few quick stops) and 2.5 hours to get down.

We saw reedbok, eland and angora goats on the mountains whilst going up. At the top we saw a cape vulture and a Drakensberg Rock Jumper (beautiful orange bird unique to this area). On the way back down, Viv had to stop to pick up a stunning chameleon off the road as he would just not move out of the way of our car!

At the top we went into a basotho woman's (small) hut. They have a flag system outside to show what they're trading on any particular day (beer, bread, garments, etc). We tried some local beer (all I can say is that it was "refreshing") and some excellent wholewheat bread. We learned a few words in the local language (which I have of course now forgotten) and then we were invited to peruse her collection of traditional hats which were for sale and scattered across her bed. The big hats were quite nice - not for wearing, but being woven I had in mind that they'd make good food covers if we were eating outdoors! Anyway, in the end, I just bought a tiny hat - easier to pack (and not much cheaper!). I guess it's just a little souvenir and I figured that it would be a small contribution to this lady to say thanks for letting us in her hut.

Talk about a tourist sting! Just after I picked up and paid for the hat, Viv asked if we'd maybe like to make a "small donation" to the lady. Muriel announced that she had no small change whatsover, and so Roy ended up handing over more cash "from the three of us"!

After the visit to the hut (which was pretty brief and a little less informative than I'd imagined it would be) we were taken to the Sani Top Chalet - the highest pub in Southern Africa.
http://www.sanitopchalet.co.za/index.htm

Here we drank local beer (but not the home brew!) and ordered lunch. Whilst waiting we wandered outside on the balcony and took in the fantastic views. But we didn't linger too long - the sun was out by now but there was a howling wind and it was pretty cold! Inside we ate with Muriel. Roy had sausage and mash which was pretty hearty! I got a a "Famous Sani Sausage" with bread. It actually turned out to be a giant hot dog - but the bread was home made and really good. Muriel ordered smoked trout and it looked very good.

After lunch we set off back down... Roy learned a lesson: do not eat a huge meal when you're going to be bounced around on a horrid road for 2 hours straight afterwards!

Back at the hotel by 3.30pm, we collected our car and headed off to Gail's house, as we were staying with her that night. We had a good drive - on the proper road! - there and arrived just as it was getting dark. Gail lives in Hilton, a beautiful suburb of Pietermartizburg. Or just "Maritzburg" as the locals call it. We haven't been into the town itself, and I don't think we'll get time to.

So, Gail cooked us a spag bol and we chatted with her over a bottle of red, until we were both yawning and tired and so went to bed early. Oh - we'd watched a lightning storm from the dining room. We stayed in a self contained cottage at the side of the main house. Candy and Katie were there but just joined us for dinner as they were watching movies.

Back on the road again

2008-05-03T17:26:00.001+01:00

I walked out to see a beautiful sunrise this morning (6.15am). But after that it clouded over and it is very cool and overcast.

We're heading out on the Midlands Meander and then on to Himeville for an overnight stay in the Drakensberg mountains.

http://www.midlandsmeander.co.za/midlands/index.html

I'm not sure quite how I would describe the Meander. I guess you could say it is a scenic drive with shops and cafes and restaurants along the way. I had in my mind that they'd all be quite close together but they aren't. And the Meander route is quite confusing as it isn't one loop route as such but there are little branches going off it all over the place! We wanted to be off the Meander by lunchtime as we didn't want to arrive at Moorcroft Manor too late.

So, we stopped only a few times - at Higgly Piggly - a small centre with farm shop, cafe, plant nursery, ceramic place and a few other shops. We bought some wine there. Next we called in at Decadance where they feature stunning artwork made of beads. And then into Spiral Blue - kind of an Eastern shop. Finally we called in (after 3kms up a dirt track) to Swissland - a wooden chalet surrounded by goats. Guess what they sell there? Yup, cheese. We tasted a lot of cheeses but decided against buying a "picnic platter" there as it was not quite warm enough to sit outside for long.

We decided to go for a proper lunch stop at Bierkassl - which had been recommended by G. We arrived at 12.45-ish. The sun had popped out so we grabbed the last remaining outside table only to find it was in the shade. This resulted in a squabble as I said that if Roy had been faster (he'd been faffing around in the car park) we'd have got into the sun.
We were ignored by 2 or 3 different waiters until about 10 past 1. By now we were both really irritable. Eventually we saw a menu, but realised that there were no "snacky" things or sandwiches on there. So we told our waiter we were leaving and he suggested going round the corner to a place called Aladdin's Lamp. We parked up there and it took us a good 5 minutes to find the cafe. When we did there was a big sign up announcing its closure until further notice.

So, back to the main road and we called in to the Nathan Road Junction Deli. It was awful! We got toasted sandwiches (mine had the weirdest looking bacon I'd ever seen on it) and cold chips. The salad was not so fresh looking. Only saving grace was that the coffees were quite good. And it didn't cost much!

So, on we went. We studied our map and decided on an alternate route to the one Gordon had told us to take. We ended up on the Souter Pass. Now this was not a steep mountain pass, but after a while on it the tarmac changed to a dirt road. And it went on and on and on like that for 50kms - horrible, bumpy, pot hole filled dirt track. And this time we weren't in the 4X4. I felt really bad that I had taken G's car on such an awful road. That said, the scenery was stunning. We were following the Drakensberg south. And saw a beautiful Jackal buzzard on the way.

We arrived at Moorcroft Manor at 4-ish. That dirt trail only finished about 2kms before the hotel and had taken some time to negotiate. Moorcroft is fantastic. We've been upgraded to a suite, we think - the bath is the best bath in South Africa! They have a free ironing service here so Roy put a pair of trousers in, as they needed doing. They were back in record time! And for this brilliant hotel we're paying £30 each, bed and breakfast. We'd be in the tiniest of rooms if we had a B&B in Britain for that price.
http://www.moorcroft.co.za/default.htm

We walked around the little dam at the foot of the hotel grounds - watched herons and hadehas and fishermen. There was a beautiful sunset over the mountains but it's not a clear night. Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

We had a decanter of sherry in our room so we took a tipple before going to dinner. Then in the bar we were offered drinks and the menus. The food was - you know what I'm going to say - amazing. We both picked the same!
Amuse bouche: ham, cream cheese, caper
Starter: Deep fried feta with shaved smoked trout / salad and dressing, melba toast and butter
Main: Fillet steak, pepper sauce, potato wedges, carrot, broccoli
Dessert: Black Forest Cheesecake (homemade with cherries, kirsh and chocolate)
Coffees. (Irish for Roy).
I forget the exact price of this but it was under R400. The fillet was superb - flame grilled and so tender and tasty.

Overall, Moorcroft is THE best hotel we've stayed in for value. In fact, it is one of my favourite places here.

Touring the other side of Durban

2008-05-02T17:15:00.000+01:00

Woke at 6 and read my book... I'm determined to finish Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom before I leave here. After breakfast, Roy helped Gordon change a tyre on his bakkie (pick up truck) as Caitlin had borrowed it yesterday and got a flat.

Once all that was done, we took a drive out - me driving to get used to G's car as he's lending it to us for the weekend. G&M were supposed to be accompanying us on our weekend away but unfortunately they are too busy with running their business and so they can't come.

We drove around the Valley of 1000 Hills. We stopped at some nice craft shops and also to meet Gail for a coffee and pass her some stuff she'd left in G&M's the other night. Next we went to a place called Phezulu, to watch some Zulu dancing. It was really good.
http://www.phezulusafaripark.co.za/zuluculture.htm

The views of the valley of 1000 Hills from Phezulu were incredible. The weather is a little brighter today but still not brilliant. When the sun is out it's lovely - but soon cools down when it clouds over.

We stopped at the Cape Town Fish Market for lunch. Margaret recommended the grilled hake and chips - and it was very good. And not too heavy.
http://www.ctfm.co.za/home/

Back home to chill out and then Margaret cooked us a wonderful lamb roast dinner. I love how she makes butternut squash - she cooks the butternut until soft and then mashes it with butter and salt and pepper. She taught us this when she visited England last year and I have made it since. Yummy!

We sat and chatted after dinner - G&M can both talk a lot and are really good company. It is fascinating hearing about some of the adventures they've had since moving to SA in 1969. They've had some tough times, too. As a family, the SA Almans have been through a lot and yet they have not lost their spirit or verve for life.

YOU-Shakka!

2008-05-01T16:56:00.004+01:00

It is the first of May. And this week there have been two or three (I get confused) public holidays in South Africa. A lot of people have taken the full week off work.

So it is now the beginning of a long holiday weekend here. Gail took us out today on a tour of Durban city. Actually, we started by having a look at the Kloof gorge nearby my aunt and uncle's house. It is huge and very scenic. We then drove down in to Durban but we did not park up and get out to have a walk as "downtown" Durban is not considered white-friendly or safe. Such a shame. We saw the old buildings and shops and the town hall.

Next, we stopped at Ushaka. This is a very cleverly designed aquarium attraction on the newly developed section of Durban's waterfront. By the time we arrived it had started to rain, so I guess it was one of the better places to be - being largely indoors. There are some outdoor things there - including a water park - but we just had a walk round and looked at the various fish and underwater life from the Indian Ocean. The design is like a shipwreck and at some point as you walk round the whole "ship" turns upside down!

We then ran back in to the small mall which lines the entrance to Ushaka and stopped for coffee and lunch at Ninos (which is a coffee shop chain here). Gail's daughters Candice and Caitlin had joined us and we chatted and just generally hung out. Made me feel quite young ;-)

The reason today's blog is named You-Shakka is because of a standing joke with my cousin, her kids and my aunt. Auntie Margaret mispronounces Ushaka. It should be oosharkah, quite a gentle sound. Margaret says YOU-Shakker - a real harsh sound. So we were having some fun with that all day - shouting out YOU-Shakka at various points. I guess you had to be there!

We came back to G&Ms and Margaret had made curry. She makes the most fabulous lamb curry and chicken and prawn, too. With various sambals to accompany. It was delicious - apparently the secret in the recipe is blitzed up baked beans! I must try that one day.

Another early night. We get so tired here - and really, we're doing the least we've done all holiday.

A new holiday starts - our trip to Durban

2008-04-30T17:12:00.002+01:00

We were up early to pack our bags, as we fly today from Port Elizabeth to Durban. I will never know how we managed to close our cases! We had packed all of the wine we'd bought in Franschhoek - up to now we'd been able to leave it in the car boot.

We had an easy run to PE airport. Quite funny, as our Dutch friends were also flying out of PE at about the same time as us, and they had a GPS system. When we saw them at PE, they told us they'd ended up in the middle of a township!! Did we have any problems? Nope, just followed the airport signs!

On check in our luggage was 9kg overweight. Eek. However, the nice lady on the desk said she would be lenient with us and ignore it.

We flew Kulula, a low cost domestic airline. It was hilarious. I have never laughed so much on a flight - the safety announcement was comical (deliberately so). They call all their passengers "kulula fans" and deliberately make the announcement funny so that people keep listening. Clever really. Some excerpts:
"Buckle those belts around your gorgeous hips, kulula fans".
"In the event of landing in water... put on your stunning life jacket (it's just your colour) and if you feel it deflating then find this tube and BLOW baby BLOW. You never know - you might just make this!"
"In the 1,000,000 to one chance of Robert Mugabe ever stepping down, or decompression in the cabin......... Now we recommend fitting your own oxygen mask first and then helping just one other person. So if you have 2 children with you, then now is the time to decide which one you love most".

There was a load of other stuff but I'm not sure how well it will translate to blog so I'll leave it there!

We landed spot on time. Gordon and Margaret (my aunt and uncle) were there to greet us and drive us to their home - our base for the next week. The weather is not great (20 and cloudy) despite Durban being known as the Sunny City! We arrived at their place mid afternoon and sat and chatted. The views from their house are wonderful - I felt like I knew the place because, when Dad was ill and G&M came to visit him, they bought lots of photos and video clips of their house as Dad wanted to see it. They only moved here 2 years ago - my uncle designed it himself and they had it built on a plot of land they bought. When my Dad visited, they were living in a different part of Durban.

The area they live in now borders a nature reserve and there are Zebras who stand in the field at the bottom of their road....
http://www.sa-venues.com/attractionskzn/kloof.htm

Soon after, Gail (my cousin) and her youngest daughter Candice arrived and they started the Braai (South African BBQ). This was wonderful - we had the most tasty fillet steak and Gail made fantastic sweetcorn fritters and something called putu-pap. This is mealie meal (maize) cooked until crumbly and served with tomato and onion gravy - very tasty. Another recipe I've since repeated at home.

We had an assortment of other meat too and plenty of red wine was consumed.

The sad thing we learned today is that my cousin Barry is ill.

We were all in bed by 10 - it's very much an early to bed, early to rise type of life style and we're fitting in to that quite nicely!

A day in the Elephant Park

2008-04-29T16:00:00.002+01:00

We woke at 6 - we're still on Kwandwe time!
I still have an upset stomach - that bug is certainly hanging around.
We had breakfast and then joined our new Dutch friends who were on the same Addo game drive as us. Our guide is Ilana, a young girl.
It was a strange start to the morning - misty, drizzly and cold. Then, as soon as our jeep got just outside of the Park gates, all of the mist lifted and the sun was out. This was a good thing as we were freezing in the jeep (even with several layers and our "ponchos" on).

Addo Elephant Park is a National Park and we could have self driven in there - but we decided that it would be better to have a guide and so we'd booked on the trip. Ilana was excellent - she was incredibly knowledgeable and there wasn't a plant, bird, insect or mammal that she could not give detailed information about. I was hugely impressed.

http://www.sanparks.org/parks/addo/

We saw:
Red hartebeest
Kudu
Yellow Mongoose
Warthogs - everywhere!
White necked raven
Ibis (Hadeha)
Southern Booboo
Ostrich
Helmeted guinea fowl
Tortoise
And - a huge dung beetle rolling her dung ball across the road, while her male partner just watched. No further comment on this! I was so pleased to see the dung beetle as I wanted to know how big they are in real life. They're about 2-3 inches long. You're not allowed to drive over the elephant dung (which is everywhere) at Addo so as to protect this rare species.

What about eles? Oh yes - we did see some, eventually. In fact we'd given up hope. Poor Ilana must have driven up and down every single loop road in the park when all of a sudden we rounded a corner just in time to encounter a small herd of 6 munching their way through the trees and then crossing the road right by our jeep. I couldn't believe how close they come. Definitely not shy eles. Then we saw a large group in the distance down by a watering hole, including a few huge bulls - but by the time we'd got down there, the elephants had wandered on. Still, a great morning.

On our way out of the park we had to pull up sharp behind a car that had stopped. The driver was out of the car and loading plant material (Ilana said it was spekboom, which the locals eat like a salad leaf) into his boot. She shouted to him that it was illegal to a) be out of your car in the park unless at a designated spot (there are lions in Addo) and b) it was HIGHLY illegal to remove any vegetation from the park. He just smiled and said Thank You.

Stupid man. Within seconds, Ilana had clocked his vehicle reg and phoned ahead to the Park Gate to ensure that he got searched on exiting.

So - back at Elephant House for about 2. What to do this afternoon? Ilana gave us some ideas.
http://www.elephanthouse.co.za/

We decided on a drive up the Zuurberg Pass into the mountains where we'd seen a one hour circular walk. Looked like just the right length walk. We quickly found (after paying our way on to the trail) that it was another treacherous South African walk! We took a very rocky climb down and down and down (all the time thinking "I've got to get back up this) and then the trail levelled out for a while. But followed the edge of the mountain along a sheer cliff edge for some distance. We didn't look down much! Fortunately the road back up to the car park was nice and smooth and actually a fairly gentle incline. We saw some incredible insects on the trail! This was the first exercise we'd done in about a week so it was nice to stretch the legs out.

We got back in time for afternoon tea and cake (which was delicious) and then decided to have a look around the Addo Valley Raptor and Reptile Centre. We had a couple of hours to pass before getting ready for dinner and it wasn't really hot enough to sit out in the gardens.

http://www.addoraptorreptile.com/about_us.html
Now, generally speaking, I'm not a huge fan of animals in cages, but this place was a bit different.
Darren, the guy who runs it, took us round and we were there for nearly 2 hours - holding snakes, feeding hawks, meeting all his "friends". He really is a great guy - kind of a South African Steve Irwin type, really passionate about what he does. Roy loves reptiles (maybe it's a boy thing) and so was delighted to hold a baby black mamba (one of the deadliest snakes in the world). He also liked having two pythons wrapped around his neck! I can't say that I was as pleased when Darren popped one of them on my shoulders, too - but I guess you have to try these things. "Go on" he said "It's like having a massage, it's nice". It wasn't!

I did like feeding the kite and owls. Holding an owl on my (gloved) hand was very special. And very heavy! Darren takes in injured snakes and birds and he trys to rehabilitate most of the birds and let them go. I tell you - this was the best R40 I spent!

Dinner was at the Elephant House again. There is another restaurant in walking distance but we decided to stay put.
Roy: Onion, Saffron and Herb zapped tomato tart/Lamb shank, roasted veg and mash/Spiced apple pie.
Jan: Beetroot, rocket and avo salad with seeds and lime dressing/Herb baked chicken breast, potato wedges and veg/Malva Pudding with ice cream
My dinner was not quite as advertised! The seeds and lime dressing weren't there, and the chicken breast was a scrawny leg. But the malva pudding was excellent and made up for it.
We shared a bottle of white and then Roy had the largest Irish Coffee I've ever seen in my life!

Kwandwe, Day 4 and we leave today

2008-04-28T22:34:00.002+01:00

Strangely, two couples did not join the morning drive. Nick and Nicky were "having a lie in". Huh? Brian and Korbie had decided to leave at 9am for their long drive to the far end of the garden route. Now B & K safari a lot - well they live in Joburg and clearly have the cash to do it. But Nick and Nicky were on the last two days of their trip! Personally I'd have been making the most of it.

And what a fantastic drive they missed! We were joined by a lovely SA couple from Cape Town, Elizabeth and Graham.

We saw:
Elephant (we finally caught up with them. They were really noisy and were dusting their backs and "shouting" at one of the cars).
Steenbok
Rhino
Impala
Red Hartebeest
Cheetah (they were also quite active this morning, a great sighting)
Oryx
Warthogs
Ostrich
Zebra
Vervet Monkeys
Wildebeest
Springbox
Buffalo

In fact, at one point, Alfie told us we had three endangered species in our sights - black rhino, black wildebeest and cheetah. Alfie was good company. And he really knew his stuff, although I did find that early on in the trip he wasn't particularly forthcoming with info. Once we started asking questions, he did tell us a lot of stuff. Maybe he realised we actually wanted to know more about things at that point. I asked some stupid questions though! One morning we were going over a load of "humps" on the track and I asked him why they'd put speed bumps in the reserve. I think he struggled to keep a straight face as he explained that they were the park's water pipes running under the track and not speed bumps!

Another day, Brian was going on about wanting to see a Knysna Woodpecker. Alfie made some comment about how he'd probably hear it before he saw it. I piped up with: "Why - what does it sound like?". Every single person in the car just looked at me and said "It's a woodpecker". Duh! Actually, later on I read in a bird book that it also has a distinctive call so I do feel somewhat vindicated.

I became rather fond of bird watching on this trip - there are so many beautiful birds here and it is amazing what you see when you look. In fact, we did buy a Sasol (one of the two main guides to SA birds) while we were in Addo.

So, back to camp for breakfast and then our farewells. Lisa and Simone (the camp hosts) came to say goodbye. A guy called Shakes was driving us back to the Main House to pick up our car. 10 minutes in to the journey I asked the inevitable question to Roy: Did you pick up our passports and cash out of the safe? I got the inevitable answer: No.
Another turn around to get them!

As we drove ourselves out of the Reserve, we saw some lovely giraffe by the gate. It had started to drizzle by then. We had a 2 hour drive to our next port of call - the Elephant House guest house near Addo Elephant Park.

We arrived mid-afternoon. It was still raining. What a pity. The gardens (and swimming pool) here are lovely. We walked around them and when the rain went off we took a walk in nearby farm land and citrus groves. We came back for "afternoon tea" - cake and tea/coffee were being served on the terrace - and then went back to our room to chill out.

Of all the accomodations we stayed in during our trip, this was the room we liked least.
We were told we'd been upgraded from a Terrace room but the room we got was nothing special, probably the smallest of all the places we'd stayed in. I think what put me off were the "antiques" which basically meant tatty furniture and threadbare rugs in the room! Again, maybe just a matter of taste.... the room was clean, though and the bed was comfortable. Maybe by this point we'd just been spoiled rotten!! However, what we did love about Elephant House was the ambience. It's so chilled and relaxing and the staff here are just so happy! We listened to them gossiping and laughing in the kitchen and saw them playing hide and seek in the gardens one morning.

Elephant House serves dinner, and so we decided to eat here tonight. Before dinner, we were invited to take drinks on the terrace and we chatted with all the other guests over a glass of wine. We have three girl friends - one from Ireland, one from Australia and one from Oklahoma - they were good fun. We also met a lovely Dutch couple who speak about 5 languages! When dinner was served, the lady chef and waitresses came dancing through the garden, banging a gong and singing an african song to announce it!

Roy: chorizo/potato/pepper salad
Jan: Butternut fritters dusted with parmesan/salad
Both: rare beef fillet with brown onion gravy and sweet potatoes. Chocolate Lava Hot Pot and vanilla bean ice cream. Bottle of red. Coffee.
This was all very nice indeed - the beef, as ever, was exceptional.

Clive, the owner, has worked in stud farms all his life and actually worked at Coolmore stud in Ireland. Roy was so keen to chat to him! And his eyes were popping out of his head at all the horse racing books and magazines strewn around the lounge/library. He borrowed a couple to glance through during our stay.

Another coincidence - one of the other guests (the Irish girl) is a distant relative of Vincent O'Brien (famous horse racing trainer in Ireland with strong connections to Coolmore). She says that she is from the "poor side of the family"!

After dinner, somebody managed to persaude Roy to sing! Oh no! Actually he gave rather a nice rendition of "On Ilkley Moor Bar Tat" which is a famous Yorkshire song. I didn't even know he knew it!

Tomorrow we're booked on a game drive into the Elephant Park, but the good news is that we don't leave until 9am! Luxurious lie in......

Kwandwe, Day 3

2008-04-27T22:28:00.000+01:00

Morning drive:
Bushbuck
Kudu
Waterbuck
Four white rhinos
Vervet Monkeys
Terrapin

We were on the trail of elephants for most of the drive.
We heard them - trumpeting and crashing trees down. We saw and smelled their dung. We witnessed the wreckage they left behind them. We did not see elephant.

Sunday evening drive:
We had new guests - an English couple called Nick and Nicky who are both Doctors and on honeymoon. They are quite dull. We also had a new tracker who is called Banana. Banana found us four lions, a female and her three young (not tiny cubs, a bit older than that). We also saw rhino, warthog, buffalo and yellow billed duck.

A very quiet night, but then Alfie spotted a feather in our tracks - he picked it up and it was from an eagle spotted owl. So we decreed it to be our "lucky feather" and indeed it was.

On the way back to camp (shivering after dark despite wearing 4 layers and my new beanie hat) we saw not one but two Aardwolf! This was incredible - it's always a thrill to spot the rarer animals. Alfie could not believe we saw two. He got over excited thinking that one was a baby but then decided it was an adult. We also saw a porcupine.

Tonight there were no stars as it was cloudy. Back in camp we were served white gluhwein... that's how cold it is after dark here!

Kwandwe - Day 2

2008-04-26T22:08:00.000+01:00

We were awake intermittently throughout the night. Partly because a huge cricket was chirruping away ALL night in our bathroom. Roy took it outside this morning.... just 7 hours too late!

We were woken properly by a door knock at about 10 to 6. Coffee and biscuits were delivered and the coffee was sufficiently inky to wake me up nicely for the morning game drive. We all met at 6.30am and headed straight out.

Roy has dubbed Kwandwe "the Truman Show" safari and in a way I know what he means. Our first safari (honeymoon in Selous, Tanzania, 2005) was a HUGE park with no fences anywhere. Completely wild. Kwandwe is 25000 hectares - so hardly small - but because you KNOW it is a private reserve and that there are boundary fences out there, it kind of feels different.

We had a very quiet start to the drive - we were looking for elephants and lion for the Italian couple who are leaving after breakfast. We saw two tiny steenbok just after leaving the lodge, and then not much else at all for a while. Some kudu. Warthogs.
We were constantly chasing for lions, using radio contact with the other 7 cars that were out there somewhere. Eventually, we heard that a lone female was around and we found her. We were the third car there. (Another difference to Selous, who had a maximum 2 car per animal rule). She was walking down a track and then plonked herself down under a bush and proceeded to roar for her cubs or her pride. She roared several times and we watched her for quite some time. Incredible sound to hear.

After a while we moved on. We saw some red necked Francolin birds - quite rare, apparently. And that was pretty much it.

We feasted on a huge breakfast and then shortly afterwards (or so it seemed) we had lunch. In between the drive and eating we lounged around on our deck and read/watched birds/scanned the bush opposite our deck for wildlife. It was not warm enough to get into the plunge pool today. Shame.

On the afternoon drive we were joined by Brian and Korbie - a couple from Joburg. Brian was born in Liverpool and has lived in SA for 30 years. They seem nice. This afternoon was a success - we finally got to see cheetah. Roy was hoping we would, as they don't have any at in the Selous. We came across two of them (males) lying in the grass. Watched a while in the hope of them "doing something" but they didn't. This is the problem with big cats - they tend to not do a lot for about 18 hours each day! But coming back to camp after sundowners we got lucky - the two of them walked across our track in the darkness. Sia put the red light on and we watched them a little longer. Beautiful animals.

We also saw a scrub hare and some bats after dark. Other sightings on the afternoon drive were:
Buffalo
Zebra
Warthog
Eland
Red Hartebeest
Terrapin in a watering hole
Springbok
Blesbok

Each night as we came in, Alfie would comment on the clear sky and the incredible stars. I wish I knew what I was looking at. Maybe next time we'll book a trip with some astronomy thrown in!!

Tonight we all ate together with Alfie. The food was good and so was the company - although, Brian (who I think is something v. important in banking) did tend to make the whole thing have a very "corporate" atmosphere. We were also treated to Brian's views on SA politics and economy, and global politics and economy. Each of us (South African, British, Dutch) had to give details of how things were in our country. Interesting - but not quite so lighthearted for a holiday!

Guess what? Another early night.

Kwandwe, Day 1

2008-04-25T19:28:00.002+01:00

We had a long (500km) drive to Kwandwe. Right along the N2, past Port Elizabeth, Grahamstown and then inland to our game reserve. Nothing too exciting to report en route... just a long slog of a drive. We were determined to get to Kwandwe in time for the afternoon game drive so we did not stop, apart from a quick refuel at Grahamstown.

I tried to point out exciting places along the way but Roy was not over impressed by seeing (in the distance) Jeffrey's Bay, a world top 5 surfing destination. Nor was he as excited as I was when I saw a zebra from the car (in one of the first game reserves we drove past).

Arrived at Kwandwe at about 1.30pm. We checked in at the Main House and then were picked up for a 30 minute drive over to our Lodge (Great Fish River Lodge). By 2.30 we'd been greeted by one of our hosts - Simone - and were sitting down to lunch of steak sandwich. A quick look around our beautiful suite (and a very brief dip in the plunge pool) and then we were back in the main lodge to have our "induction" and set off on the first game drive.

The weather is hot today. Our ranger is Alfie, a young Afrikaner who has pretty much grown up in the bush. Proudly announces that he's never lived in a City all his life. He has a tracker called Sia who assists him, by sitting on a raised seat out at the front of the car and looking for tracks and any animals. Our companions in the jeep are a Dutch couple on their honeymoon (Alexander and Marika) and an Italian couple who speak little English. In fact, they speak little, full stop. But they are not unpleasant. In fact, the husband is a very good spotter - he sees lots of animals from his seat at the back of the jeep and calls out to let us all know when he does.

We had a good drive - looking back on my notes, I see that we spotted:
Kudu
Giraffe
Springbok
Zebra
Wildebeest
Warthog
Jackal
Baboons (who we heard howling, barking and fighting on some rocks)
Oryx
Red Hartebeest
We also saw the very rare Black Rhino - three of them lying down along side each other and then later we spotted them running along together.

Some of the best sightings, though, were after dark. We stopped for Sundowners near a lake. It was too cold for gin and tonics so I opted for coffee with a splash of brandy in it. Driving back to lodge, dusk was just turning to dark when we spotted two male giraffes "necking". This is where they push at each other - they start with their necks and then end up effectively side by side trying to barge each other out of the way. Apparently this can go on for hours - until one of them walks away and is therefore the "loser" who has failed to gain dominance. We watched them until the light completely faded. It was like a beautiful, slow motion, silent dance. Alfie said it looks elegant and gentle, but they actually really hurt each other.

Then, driving back to camp (freezing cold in the back of the open jeep - it is really chilly once that sun has gone) we were lucky to see an eagle spotted owl sitting in a tree by the edge of the track. Sia put his red filter over the spotlight - this stops the animals getting disturbed - and we watched him for a while. Then he flew off - silently and effortlessly.
I also have written in my notes that we saw a "Night bird" but I have no idea what that was? Alfie was often calling out bird names that I could not catch or remember. Oh, and we saw a huge frog on the stairs leading down to our suite when we came back from camp.

Back to camp. They met us with drinks and a roaring fire. We then quickly bathed and changed. So funny - Roy went arse over tit on the bathroom floor in the most dramatic fall I've witnessed in a long time! Luckily he was not hurt. Then back for dinner. We both ate kudu - it was delicious - the most tender meat, not unlike fillet beef.

Early to bed - our wake up call is coming at 6am tomorrow.

http://www.ccafrica.com/reserve-1-id-2-8

What a palaver!

2008-04-24T17:22:00.005+01:00

We woke at 7 to watch a beautiful sunrise over the mountains. Took a short stroll down and along the ridge before breakfast. I fell over on the way and just about managed to save my new camera from serious damage! I had a few grazes (which we get paranoid about now after my incident in Greece a few years ago) but nothing bad.

Over breakfast Martin consulted with us over our plans for the day. He approved of our proposed walk around the Robberg Peninsula and said he has sent many guests out there to do it. He also suggested a few different things for the afternoon - but our only plan was to chill out by the pool if we got back early enough. It is very hot today - so hot that we can feel it at 8am - usually it is after 9 when things start to warm up.

So, we drove to Robberg and were there by 9.30am. We parked up and set off on the "short" walk which takes 2 and a half hours. Martin had mentioned some "challenging" parts of the trail involving cliffs. The "long" walk takes 4 - we felt that to be slightly ambitious.

After a short walk downhill (on rocky steps) we found ourselves literally scrambling over cliffs. With a sheer drop into the sea. We then had a nice flat section through fynbos (and even a little shade at one point) before dropping down a huge sand dune. The sand dune led down (steeply) to a beautiful "double beach" bay called Witsand. As we made our way down, Roy was some distance ahead of me. I've never been fond of walking on soft sand, and I spotted a ridge running along the middle of the dune, to my right, which was covered in footprints. I wondered if this was the trail (but there were no signposts). So I decided to take it anyway. I was being smart - there was no way I was walking all the way down to the beach if I had to walk back UP the dune to pick up the trail again. I shouted to Roy and signalled to him what I was doing. He waved and carried on to the beach.

I stood and watched him disappear in to a distant dot on the beach. He was taking of his trainers - they must have been FULL of sand by now - and walking along the beach. I carried on walking to my right. I figured that we'd catch up with each other eventually. What I hadn't reckoned on was that the closer to the sea we got, it became impossible to shout - as the crashing waves just totally drowned out any voices. I also didn't cater for the series of smaller dunes below me, which as I moved along the ridge, were now blocking my view of the beach. I could only see sections of it. I could not see Roy at all. I stood. I waited. I assumed that he'd come in to view at any minute.

After a while, still no sign. I shouted and screamed but of course this was pointless. At this point I started to get concerned. It was now blazing hot, and Roy was carrying all of our water supply. If I couldn't find him, I'd have to start to make my way back on to the trail - but I had no idea which way the trail actually went - left or right off the beach? It looked like you could get up either way. I have no sense of direction and couldn't figure out which way the car park was. I started to panic slightly. What if Roy didn't realise I'd headed back and spent all day in the hot sun looking for me? What if he got seriously sun burned or dehydrated? How was I going to climb back up to the car park with no water? My thoughts soon turned quite ridiculous - WHAT IF Roy had gone for a paddle in the sea and been swept away by a huge wave, and was now drowning in the bay at the mercy of sharks?

It all seems so stupid now, but how quickly your imagination can take hold!

Ok, so the priority was to find the trail back to the car park. Either that or go back the way we'd come. (By the way, there was not a soul around on this section of the walk, just the two of us!).

I took out the tiny map we'd been given when we paid into the car park (this is National Park and there was a fee to come in). I studied carefully. Nope, still could not work out which way to go.... but at least I learned that the beach ahead of me was called Witsand. There were three trails on the map, and I couldn't make head or tail of it. I noticed a telephone number on the back... ah, the number for Robberg Peninsula office! Luckily I had my mobile phone in my bag. I called them... the ranger must not have believed what he heard!

Me: Hello, I'm halfway down the big sand dune with Witsand ahead of me and I've lost the trail.

Ranger: You've lost the trail, madam?

Me: Yes. I need to know if I turn right or left to get back to the car park.

Ranger: Go down to the beach, turn right and you'll see the trail signs at the base of the rocks where the beach ends.

Me: Ah, thank you. I've also lost my husband but I'm sure he's just in the sand dunes somewhere. I'll call you back if I can't find him.

Ranger: stunned silence.

So, I also twigged that if I went right down on to the beach, I might stand a chance of Roy being able to see me (assuming he was still alive!). So I did. As I reached the bottom of the dunes, I saw him standing to the right of the beach, pointing at the trail signs. We walked toward each other - I put my arms out to him and wailed "I thought I'd lost you".

"Don't be so bloody daft!" he said. "I've been walking up and down those sand dunes looking for you - I'm knackered!".

So, all was well. But I was slightly put out by the lack of drama in our reunion! Didn't he realise how panicked I'd been! LOL.

We then headed back on to the cliffs for another section of scary cliff climbing. Wow, I never thought I'd do this kind of stuff, I'm a bit of a wimp when it comes to heights and things like that. Then the worst bit - the climb back up seemingly endless and massively steep steps. With plenty of water stops, I made it. What a stunning walk. And challenging. I forgot to mention the dozens of smelly and noisy seals we'd seen playing in the water beneath us en route.

Back at the car park, I opened the car and put the engine on to get the aircon going. (Did I mention how HOT it was today?). What you need to know is that this hire car has keyless ignition. So you point and press it to open the doors, and providing the "clicker" is within 4 meters of the car, it will start when you press a button on the dash. All you need to do is pop the clicker in your pocket or in the front of the car somewhere. We'd been using one of the cup holders as our repository for the clicker whilst driving.

Roy was faffing about with his trainers and socks - still trying to get the sand out - so I sat on a wall near the car and had a long drink of water. What we really both wanted was a large, cold beer and a sandwich. We'd heard of a bar called the Lookout - right on the beach at Plettenberg - so we planned to drive there for lunch.

When we got there, we just managed to bag the last parking place near the bar. We hopped out, and I went to lock the car. Hmm. Where is the clicker? I said that I thought I'd dropped it in the cup holder when I opened the car. Not there. We searched the car inside and out - no sign of the clicker. I got back in and pushed the ignition button. A message flashed up saying "Key missing". Oh no - I must have dropped it in the car park at Robberg (5 miles away). What to do? Roy went into the bar and asked for a taxi number. They gave him the details for a local firm. When I called, the guy said he was "out of town" and would not be back until 5pm. I asked if he knew of any other taxis and he said no. Back to the bar. We tried the second number they gave us (bear in mind this was an incredibly busy place and this one waitress was kind enough to stop and look in Yellow Pages to help Roy) and it was not answering. On the third visit to the bar, a barman called Bobby said that he knew of somebody and he made a phone call. Yes - his friend would be down with us in about 5 minutes. I had visions of the key either being stolen - or even worse, run over by another car in the car park! Assuming, of course, that's where it was!

So this really nice lady picked us up - we both left the hire car (there was nothing in it to steal, and lets face it, it wasn't going anywhere!) in the charge of the local car guard. As soon as we pulled into Robberg car park, a guy stepped out of his car and said "Lost something? Keys?". Yes! He had them. Thank you god. So we headed back to the Lookout and we finally got that beer and sandwich we needed! Just an hour late (and several rand lighter after paying our taxi bill and tips to the kind people in the bar who helped us!).

We then drove along to Keurboom beach, which was lovely and deserted. Finally got back to Fynbos Ridge to laze by the pool and listen to bird song and insects whilst trying to spot, photograph and identify birds.

The stars here are incredible at night. We can see the Milky Way again.

Martin had given us a couple of recommendations for dinner this evening and so we headed to Fu.shi in Plett Bay.

http://www.fushi.co.za/fushi-about.html

If you have a few minutes spare, look at the menu.... the names of each dish are superb! We had a fantastic meal here. Again, the value was superb - R400 for three courses, coffee and bottle of white wine.
Jan: Tempura Veg and Peanut Sauce, followed by Masala Kingklip with pumpkin risotto. Chocolate Chilli Fondant with pistachio brittle.
Roy: Beef strips wrapped in roti with salad, Masala Kingklip with pumpkin risotto and Mango Brownie with mango ice cream and lychees.
Wonderful. The choc chilli fondant was superb - I asked the waitress what type of chilli they put in and she said fresh red chilli. I've since made this at home and it was yummy!

Home to Fynbos Ridge. Big drive tomorrow.

Onward to Plettenberg Bay - via the scenic route

2008-04-23T15:21:00.003+01:00

Well it is time to hit the road again! We were up and out early (8.45am) for our drive over to Prince Albert and then onto Plettenberg Bay (Plett).

Today is the day we drive the Swartberg Pass and we've been looking forward to this. Although I have to admit to waking up worrying about it in the night. I'd read some reports on travel websites about how "scary" it was.

Over breakfasts (disappointingly we saw no dolphins, whales or sharks this morning) Gary discussed our route with us and suggested a couple of other passes we might wish to try - he seems to think that as our hire car is a 4WD then we should get our money's worth out of it.

So, off we go - first of all over the Kaiman River Pass - where it is incredible to see the river rushing into the ocean. Passing through George we notice big developments of Retirement Homes - e.g. Cabernet Retirement Haven. To us, they look less like Havens and more like Maximum Security Prisons.

We take the Montagu Pass instead of the Outeniqua pass. Montagu is the small, single track, rocky dirt trail that was there before the building of the large, tarmac-d Outeniqua. It was not a great road - so bumpy and all along there is a dread of meeting any oncoming traffic, as passing places are tight and infrequent. Anyway, we survived it.

I love the colours on the Outeniqua (Montagu looks over the same mountains) Mountains. Photographs just cannot do this landscape justice. There is moss green, willow green, emerald green, pale terracotta - just beautiful layers of colour. As we head on to the road toward Oudtshoorn the earth turns red and we see ostrich in almost every field.

After Oudtshoorn we start to climb toward Swartberg Pass. Signs tell us that the pass is OOP - open. Good news! Just a short way up the Pass we see a small antelope - he runs across the road in front of us and then jumps round the rocks to our right. I think it is a Grysbok. Vistas from up the pass are stunning. We stop a few times to look and take photographs. At Die Top (the top) we can see our descent track toward Prince Albert. It was a reasonably challenging drive (hairpin bends and steep hills) but not as scary as those websites had led me to believe.

http://www.patourism.co.za/swartberg%20pass.htm#tour

So we arrive at Prince Albert just in time for lunch. It is a very hot day and so tuna / greek salads are ordered. The bread is home made and lovely - like Irish soda bread but with seeds. Iced coffees are like milkshakes.

Prince Albert is a pretty town, albeit small. There is one main road which is wide and lined with lovely buildings on each side. We ate at the Swartberg Hotel, on a veranda covered with bouganvillea.

On the roads here we'd seen signs warning of "Tortoise Crossing". We weren't sure if this related to real tortoises or slow drivers! On our way out of Prince Albert we found out - as we stopped to watch a beautiful leopard tortoise cross the road. In fact, Roy got out to help him up the kerb, and tickle him under the chin, as apparently (according to Roy) this is what tortoises like. In fact we rowed over this incident, as I advised just leaving him alone. But Roy asked me "don't you know anything about tortoises, you're supposed to tickle them under the chin!". Even wild tortoises, in Africa?? I'm not so sure.

On the road to Meiringspoort we see baboons in the fields and a lot of ostrich farms. You can, if you wish, visit an ostrich farm and even ride on one for fun (they have races). While I'm all for doing touristy things, that is the sort of thing that is not for me!

Meiringspoort is interesting - it's a mountain pass that goes through the valley floor - not over the mountain and it is a spectacular gorge. We didn't even try to take photographs as I don't think I could have captured the rock formations and colours.

For a long time this afternoon, crossing the karoo from de Rust to Uniondale, we are the only car on the road. We see some meerkat running across the road and also lots of those lovely karoo lamb, grazing. Cactus and aloe plants are everywhere.

After Uniondale, things took a turn for the worse! We stopped to fill up with petrol and then could not find our turn off. Our plan, advised by Gary, was to cross the Prince Alfred's Pass down in to Knysna. So we're looking for signs to the 339 road to Knysna. Eventually we realised that the road sign had been covered up and the road ahead was marked Closed.

So, looking at the map, we had two alternatives - drive back via George - 100kms away OR try to find a way onto the pass a bit further on. We weren't sure if this was possible as we didn't know which section of the road was closed. We REALLY didn't want to drive back to George and so we tried to find a way round onto the Pass.

At Avontuur there was a link road on to the pass, but it was also marked Closed. And yet I saw some cars coming off it. Avontuur is a tiny place but luckily they had a Post Office open. Roy went in to ask if somebody knew an alternative route (other than George!). The guy in the Post Office who spoke English told him to ignore the signs and go on to the Pass. "You'll be ok". Hmmm. What to do? Eventually we took a decision to chance it - after all, if it was closed at some point we could turn round and come back.

Well, it was NOT a pass you'd want to come back on! It was very bendy and steep, and not a great road. I think it is about 20kms long. Halfway up we saw a car coming the other way so we flashed him and he stopped... he told us the road was open. Well, he didn't actually say that, he just said "keep going, you'll get through". This pass was much worse than Swartberg - sheer drops down off the mountain pretty much all the way round. We thought we would never come off this pass. In fact, we didn't really. All the way to Knysna. After the "Prince Alfred Pass" the road turned into a forest and twisted and turned for another 70kms down to the N2 (main road to Plett). We got stuck behind forest workers going home and driving slowly, the dust off their cars was awful. There was a huge township up in the forest - we weren't expecting to see that!

Eventually we hit the main road - were we glad to see tarmac again! We had about 30kms to Plett. Arrived there about 5.15ish. Another full day's driving. The last two hours of it were 2 hours too many!

Fynbos Ridge was our accommodation in Plett.

http://www.fynbosridge.co.za/index.html

We were expecting to be staying in a room in the main house, but when we arrived, Martin - the gay looking/sounding manager (who was not gay!), told us that because they were having some work done on the roof of the main house, he'd upgraded us to a self catering cottage. But that we could still come up for breakfasts in the house. The cottage was fantastic - 2 bedrooms, huge lounge, kitchen and 2 bathrooms. The patio outside had a braai (bbq), table and chairs and sun loungers on it. And the views! On the left we had the Outeniqua Mountains and on the right the Tsitsikamma Mountains. The house is on a ridge over looking forest. Bird life is incredible here and the whole atmosphere is so peaceful and quiet.

The lounge and master bedrooms also had fires set up in them. All we needed to do was strike a match and so, even though it wasn't very cold, Roy lit the fire in the lounge.

Martin had booked us in for dinner at the main house - they do dinner a couple of times each week for guests. We wandered over there at 7-ish. There was only us and a British family (currently living in Joburg) staying at Fynbos Ridge so it was pretty quiet. We all chatted over an aperitif in the lounge and then dinner was served. R400 for 3 courses, aperitifs and a bottle of First Sighting red. We had prawn cocktail, steak, veg and potatoes and coffee chocolate mousse. Oh and coffee. Good home cooking and incredible value. We were back in our room at 9. Martin had made a huge fuss over us and amused us by presenting each dish with a grand flourish and an order to "indulge". So funny. He also kept on and on about how romantic it would be for us in the cottage. I did tell him that Roy had discovered Sports Channels on the satellite tv!!!

Liz - she owns Fynbos with her husband Brian - kept wandering in for a chat in between courses at dinner. She has an unfortunate high pitched voice but seems nice. Overall, the team here do pester you a bit too much to check that everything is ok. But I'm not complaining about that. Liz and Brian have only recently bought the place and so I guess they are keen to keep up its excellent reputation.

Early night. Was it romantic? I'm not telling.

Sharks, Dolphins and the Whale that got away

2008-04-22T16:39:00.004+01:00

We knew that there was a fair chance of seeing dolphins from Dune Guest Lodge and Gary (the owner) had mentioned that they often came by in the morning and afternoon. So we were on Dolphin Watch before, during and after breakfast.

http://www.thedune.co.za/ We were in the Ocean Room.

We woke really early - about 6.30am and so got up and went for a walk along the beach. The sun rises over the mountains here so we caught it just touching the waves as we headed back to our room. Back in the room, we thought we saw a dolphin jump, but Gary said if it was a solitary animal then it was most likely to have been a shark. Gary is 6'7" and was brought up in Switzerland where he played pro basketball. As is the nature of Swiss people, he has a very serious manner about him but is a really nice guy who likes to help us plan our time. He has given us some ideas for today.

We both still have this stomach bug. Today is Roy's day for feeling ill. We drove to Knysna and parked up - it is quite a big place. We decided against any big trips here (there is a boat trip/walk you can do) as Roy is feeling pretty awful by now. So we decided to have a gentle stroll around Knysna, and then drive up to Knysna Heads which are the "entry point" for the sea, into the Knysna Lagoon. The lagoon is smooth but the area around the heads is really choppy and apparently dangerous. So we drive to a view point and take in the scenery.

I haven't mentioned Car Guards yet. These are guys (occasionally girls, too) who stand over parking spaces on the roadside and signal to you where there is a free space. Then while you're away, they "look after" your car for you. For this, you're expected to tip. We were dishing out R10 or R20 to these people and later found out the usual tip is R3-R7! The funny bit is when you get back to your car and (I guess to justify the tip) they stand guiding you out of your very easy to get out of car space! Well it used to amuse me, anyway. My guess is that few of them can actually drive.

Anyway, I was going to make the point that the Car Guards have now also found niches in the various "viewing points" and stand there while you get out of your car for, oooh a whole 5 minutes and look at the view. These guys I begrudge tipping! Car Guards can make a day out driving around pretty expensive, actually... especially when you tip at R20 a time!

So - having left Knysna, we drove around the Seven Passes Road (seven small mountain passes) through Barrington to see the Big Tree. This is an Outeniqua yellow wood tree, at a place called Woodville and is over 33 metres high, that's 100+ feet. It is 800 years old and has a circumference of over 12 metres. (Note: you can tell Roy was in charge of the journal today - so many facts!).

Seven Pass road starts off like being in the English country side. And then all of a sudden you're above a big forest canopy. We got out of the car here to have a look and all we could hear was the buzzing of a a million insects coming up from the trees. We ended up at a view point called the Map of Africa. Looking down, the river bends around forested land causing it to be shaped exactly like..... a map of Africa! We then walked over to the paragliding "run off" slope where we had amazing views of the beach and ocean all the way from Wilderness to Knysna.

After a quick lunch in Wilderness, we finally got back to the Dunes where we planned to spend the rest of the (hot) day chilling out by the pool. I'd arranged for Mum to phone me at the guest house and just as we got back to our room to take the call, Roy spotted a pod of about 50-60 dolphins heading our way... they swim in really close to the shore line and we could see them quite clearly. So, unfortunately we had to tell Mum to call back later, after we'd watched them! It was so cool - they were "surfing" in on the big waves. Mum called back and about 5 minutes later the dolphins all came back the other way!

Gary told us that if we'd been back an hour earlier, we'd have seen the first whale of the season making its way along the ocean. He promised to let us know if he saw it again.....

We took a walk along the beach before having an early shower. There is load shedding here tonight, from 6-8pm (basically this means a power cut) and so we needed to be ready before the lights all went out. After the power went, we sat and watched the light fade while drinking a half bottle of Graham Beck Champagne. The sky was incredible while the lights were out - the stars here are amazing but seemed even more so with no street lighting etc.

So tonight we'd booked dinner at a restaurant called Serendipity. We were greeted on arrival by Joseph who offered us aperitifs - I had chilled white port with a twist of lemon peel. It was excellent. Roy had "ratafia" - a chardonnay based brandy. The food was exceptional. Absolutely amazing, and it cost us just £25 each for the food, a bottle of wine, coffee and aperitifs. The restaurant is small and run by Liselle and her husband Rudolf.
While you're sipping your aperitif, Rudolf comes through to the lounge and explains the menu - there are two choices for each course. He goes in to huge detail about where the ingredients are sourced, exactly how they're cooked and so on - in fact, he sells them all so well it is difficult to choose!
Eventually we ate:
An amuse bouche - I am sad to say I can't remember what it was! But it was good!
Starter - Ostrich bobotie spring roll with peach chutney and peppadew sauce.
Soup - Carrot and Cumin
Sorbet - campari and orange ice lolly!
Main - Jan: Peking duck confit, mash, sweet potato and white potato crisps, carrots, spiced red cabbage. Roy: Karoo beef (Wow!), jus, samp and beans (African corn and beans - popular side dish), ratatouille.
Dessert - Jan: Rooibos (a type of smokey tea) pannacotta, rooibos ice cream, cape date and brandy cake, pecans and brandy spiced sauce, dried fruit compote and a brandy snap! Roy: Peppermint crisp (chocolate and mint parfait type of thing). I can't remember what his came with as I was too busy eating mine!
Coffees.

A South African couple we met there insisted on giving us a glass of champagne from a bottle they'd bought. We also shared a bottle of First Sightings Shiraz.

All in all it was a wonderful evening, and Liselle's food matched (and maybe even outdid) the quality of food we had in Franschhoek. Serendipity is also a guest house, run by Liselle's mum, and I'd love to stay there one day.........

Gary from the Dunes was in there with his wife. As we left we said goodnight and Roy joked to him "I thought I'd left you on whale watch!". In typical Swiss style, he did not laugh!

http://www.serendipitywilderness.co.za/chef.htm

Not your typical Monday morning

2008-04-21T15:49:00.003+01:00

Woke at 6.30am. Two hours before breakfast, but we need to pack as we want to be on the road straight after we eat - it will be a long drive today.

Before breakfast we took a short walk in the village. My friend Lynn has bought a property in Franschhoek so we went to take a good look. It is beautiful - just one street down from where we stayed.

After breakfast, we consulted with Arthur about our route to Wilderness and (having established that we like driving and don't mind taking the long way round to see a bit of scenery) he gave us an alternative to the boring motorway. Arthur warned us off also trying to fit in the Swartberg pass en route to Wilderness - far too big a drive, in his opinion.
We set off just 21 minutes behind Roy's schedule (once you get chatting to K and A you don't get away easily).

We went over the stunning Franschhoek pass again. Protea bushes line the road and are still in bloom. Two eagles were sitting on a signpost up at the top. The flowers on the flood plain next to the dam were bright red and yellow and I wish I knew what they were.

On the way out off the pass and toward Villiersdorp, it suddenly hit me that we had not emptied the safe in our room. Oh great - we were heading 400km away with no passports, cash or credit cards! So we had to turn back. Nightmare. We'd only done 25 - 30kms - but all of it on mountain pass road! After a 10 minute wait for baboons to finish playing in the road, we finally got back over to Akadamie St.

K and A told us they'd have had our stuff couried to us in Wilderness, but we'd not have got that far as we needed petrol. In fact, we did our first fill up in Villiersdorp.

I loved the Franschhoek Pass but to drive over it 3 times in one morning was excessive!

Villiersdorp through to Robertson felt like being in the Wild West of America... different landscape from Franschhoek. The winelands continue here - I never realised how much wine they grew in SA. The estates line the roads bordering their vineyards with beautiful pink or red flowers. We passed a shanty town at Ashton and then onto the road to Montagu. Above a tunnel and hidden in the rocks is an Old English Fort - which I spotted but didn't get a photo as I was jumping back in the car so that we could get back on the road ahead of a huge wagon!

At Montagu we marvelled at the coloured rocks - layers of brown, green, red, gold. We pulled in to a parking space at Montagu but did not have time to explore. It's a really pretty place. I read Dad's diary, as he'd stayed 2 days here and absolutely loved it. They spent most of their day here at the Hot Springs. As we drove out, I just felt a wave of grief and started to cry. In fact I cried for a long time. Luckily, Roy was driving. I put Dad's diary away and never read it again on the trip. Couldn't. I left it with Uncle Gordon as we left Durban to come home.

I really would have liked to drive the Tradouw Pass, (which Dad had also been over) but it was not to be - no time, and it would have been a detour for us. The signs kept reading "Oop de Tradouw Pass". Which we found amusing (I think you have to be from Yorkshire to get that one - "oop" here means "up"). However what it really means (translated from Afrikaans) is "The Tradouw Pass is open."

Through Barry Dale and Ladismith we noticed the landscape changing again - here there is still coloured rock (and a lot of red rock) but the hills are smaller and further away from you and the flatter open areas are semi-arid. This area is the Klein Karoo (little Karoo).

All over the place we see people walking on the roads. Given that the villages and towns here are miles apart, these people must walk a long way. Children coming to and from school, adults, going who knows where? You find yourself wondering "Where are they going? Where have they been? Why?" The homes that clearly belong to farm workers are tiny - but at least they aren't squatter homes.

I find myself singing the Culture Club song, Karma Chameleon in my head as I stare at the rocks along the Huis River Pass:
"Loving would be easy if your colors were like my dream. Red, gold and green. Red, gold and green".

At Calitzdorp, we stopped at the Bo Paas Estate, to take a Port tasting session! Well, Roy did, I picked up the drive from here so didn't indulge. We bought some port here to take home. Only a small bottle - our case is getting heavy!

We called in to the Rose of Karoo restaurant for food, and after finding out they did takeaway we decided to save time and buy sandwiches and milk tarts (yummy!) and coffee. We stopped at a picnic laybe overlooking the red stone hills to eat them and then got back on the road.

We drove through Oudtshoorn, which actually is a big town and famed for its Ostrich Farms. The fields around Oudtshoorn are vivid green (the lucerne/alfalfa that ostrich like to eat) and ostriches are everywhere. I find them funny as they always pull their heads up to stare at you as you drive by. Not at all shy!

After Oudtshoorn we head through a town called George. Unfortunately this is at "rush hour" and traffic is busy and slow - we get stopped at every single Robot (traffic light). Eventually we cross yet another pass - the Outeniqua Pass - can I say "stunning" again?

A sneaky road camera sits at the bottom of the Pass where the speed limit changes very quickly from 80 to 40 - luckily we'd been warned about this by a waiter in Cape Town and so we knew what to expect.

Finally - we are in Wilderness. It is by now 5.30pm and so we've been driving all day. The Guest House here is lovely. A spacious, open plan house. Our room has a floor to ceiling glass wall from which we can see the ocean. So we headed straight down to the beach (our house is elevated so there are about 100 steps down) and took a nice long walk to stretch our legs out. This takes us to sunset time and as we head back, we see a fabulous "moon rise" with the moon emerging like a golden ball out of the ocean.

That evening we went to Pomodoro - an italian restaurant in Wilderness village. We shared mushroom and grilled polenta to start, and then both had pizza. Roy's was goat cheese and butternut squash, mine was roasted veggies - I was surprised to see beetroot on a pizza, but actually it was pretty good. The pizza base was extra thin and crispy. We ordered "small" pizzas with greek side salads but overall the portions were huge. To finish I tried pannacotta and Roy had tiramisu. Coffees. Water. Bottle of Red. All for less than R440 (about £26). Amazing value.

Sunday Lunch with a difference

2008-04-20T15:00:00.000+01:00

Woke at 7.30am. Felt a lot better for my temperature breaking overnight.

Breakfast at 8.30am. Katharine and Arthur do the best breakfast ever! Home made granola and yoghurt. Home made fruit smoothie. Fruit platter with about 20 different type of fruit on it - apparently they like to compete to see how many they can put on the plate. I didn't know the names of about 5 of the fruit. Good strong coffee. Dried fruits soaked in syrup and spices. Then they send out hot croissants, spiced buns (hot cross buns) and toast. With gorgeous preserves from Hillcrest Berry Farm. We loved the Cape Gooseberry jam.
http://www.hillcrestberries.co.za/HILLCREST%20BERRY%20ORCHARDS.html
When Katharine and Arthur ask if you want eggs and bacon, it is very tempting, as you know they'll be good. But the answer has to be no - because after what you've already eaten, you just can't manage another mouthful.

Afer breakfast, we took a walk round the village. Or should I say down the High Street as the village is spread along a 1.5km road. It's lovely - lots of shops, restaurants (there are 36 in the whole Franschhoek area) and then the Hugenot Memorial and plenty of churches. Today a great gathering of bikers was in town.

Next, we drove up to Boschendal for a walk in the beautiful gardens.
http://www.boschendal.com/
I'm going to have to be careful about how often I use the word "stunning" to describe things. But Boschendal was. Parked under the trees outside the house, was a line of Vintage Cobra cars. Must have been a Cobra owners day out, as there was a large group of people sitting in the cafe when we walked past.

Then we drove back toward Franschhoek and called into Hillcrest Berry farm for some jam. We also bought some cherry and aniseed chutney - apparently it goes well with blue cheese.

After that we pulled off the main road into Graham Beck wine estate for a tasting.
We'd taken quite a liking to the Graham Beck Sauvignon Blanc we'd tried and also the champagne they made. Actually, it isn't called champagne as the French have ownership of that. It is called Methode Cap Classique or Methode Champenoise. Graham Beck is a state of the art wine estate. In the tasting room you can see right into the production area (bottling and packing). Unfortunately, it being Sunday, nobody was working there.

http://www.grahambeckwines.com/
We proved once and for all that we're cheap by both preferring, of all 5 wines we tried, the cheapest Sauvignon Blanc. So we bought a couple of bottles to take to Durban with us. Graham Beck was unusual in that they will let you taste the expensive wines - most tasting rooms only give samples of the low-mid price ranges. So I took advantage and tried their most expensive red. It was nice, but I have to say I did not tell much difference from a mid priced bottle. Where I had noticed a difference (in Chamonix the day before) was the taste of the low price bottle compared to the mid price. Maybe I do have some taste after all.

We were booked in to La Petite Ferme for 1.30pm. by the time we arrived the place was full - booking IS essential here. Our table had wonderful views over the Franschhoek Valley - and guess what? The sun was out! No rain today. It was actually very pleasant.

The food? Well it was ok. I can't say it was excellent, but I think the overall "Petite Ferme" experience just has to be tried when in Franschhoek.
Starters: Jan had Ricepaper stuffed with blue cheese, pear, pecan, mint & herb dressing. Good, but the rice paper was totally unnecessary I felt. Roy had mini mozzarella (bocconcini) with roast carrots, caraway seed, tomato dressing and mixed leaves. Great bread.
Mains: Jan - Roast loin of pork with ginger, plum and cinnamon compote. This was great. The accompanying porcini, potato and chestnut cake was cold and unnecessary. Roy - rabbit stew with polenta and wilted greens. Also good... very garlicky! Great side order of roasted veggies. Bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. Dessert was the real let down. We ordered "crespelle" (cold crepe/pancake) filled with banana and marscapone and chocolate sauce. It just did not work at all. We took our coffee outside into the beautiful gardens and sat and watched it all go by for a little while... it was by now really warm outside.

Next we drove up Franschhoek Pass. So pretty and with superb views of the village. We saw baboons a plenty up there, too.

For this evening we have in mind that we need to find a place where we can just get some cheese, bread and wine to eat. We strolled around the village between 5-6pm and realised that most places here are actually proper restaurants. Whilst lots of menus looked great, after that lunch we could not face a full meal. So we decided to call in at Pick and Pay and buy some cheese and bread, and crack open one of our Chamonix Cab Savs to drink with it.

Walking around the village we noticed a memorial fountain that had been funded by Arthur Mc William Smith (our host at Akademie Street Guest Houses). Later we read in a guide that he'd had this done in memory of a son who went missing whilst travelling in Europe back in 1994. Back home, I also found out that Arthur is an ex-Mayor of Franschhoek and has been instrumental in building the village to its current position of "gourmet capital of SA".

So tonight we stayed in. We lit the patio heater and sat out eating our cheese platter and bread. We also had some choc chip cookies (we bought them in Cape Town one day and the bag was huge) and finished with Amarula and coffee.

Roy watched a noisy movie on tv while I read up on our next destination - Wilderness.

Leaving Cape Town

2008-04-19T20:19:00.006+01:00

Woke at 7. Didn't sleep well and had dreamed I was being arrested for speeding in SA.
Got up at 8. It was raining, cool and cloudy. Felt a bit grotty this morning, felt like I might be getting a cold, had a scratchy throat.

Roy smashed a glass while we were packing so that delayed us somewhat as we had to find a maid to help us clear it up.

By 10.30am, when we left the Waterfront, the weather was just starting to clear up a bit. We didn't go straight to Franschhoek, but did a quick detour to Bloubergstrand - a beach over the other side of Table Bay where you get stunning views of Table Mountain. This morning the tablecloth was definitely on!

We were in Franschhoek for lunchtime. It is an easy drive, mostly on motorway. The only thing to watch out for is men running across the freeway! Whilst three lanes of traffic are bombing along at 80 - 120km per hour. Crazy.

Franschhoek is gorgeous. Truly gorgeous. A quiet, well kept, beautiful village. It seems like you're surrounded by mountains. Once in the village, you wonder how you got in there as you feel totally encircled by the hills.

Akademie Street Guesthouses are everything that Tripadvisor promised!
http://www.aka.co.za/
Our cottage is Vreugde, meaning Joy. And it was. There is a kitchenette, fridge stocked with champagne, spirits, beer, juice, and a tray of fruit. We also have crisps and nuts. And the bed is huge and extremely comfortable. Somehow, I don't think we'll be using the lovely plunge pool in our private garden, which is a huge shame.

We took a walk into the country - Katharine, our host, gave us a map for a nice walk - and went through vineyards and past stables to an estate called Grande Provence.
http://www.grandeprovence.co.za/
We stopped there for our first wine tasting session. We planned to eat there, but there was nothing "light" on the menu and as we only wanted a salad or some cheese, we decided to carry on. Back in the village, we turned off toward Chamonix - guess what? Another bloody big hill to walk up! But we knew that they had a restaurant and so we could combine lunch and wine tasting. When we finally reached the restaurant, it had just started to absolutely bucket down with rain. A lady came out and apologetically told us that the restaurant and kitchen had just closed. But that there was another wine estate with a restaurant just another 200m up the hill. I refused to walk another step further (uphill). In fact I threw a tantrum at Roy. I can get like that when I'm hungry!
http://www.chamonix.co.za/
Because of the rain, and my complete refusal to walk any further up the hill, we decided to go in to Chamonix Tasting Room - which was still open. For R20 (just over a pound) we got to taste 4 different wines and also a schnapps. They were not stingy when they filled the tasting glasses either! So - we ended up having a liquid lunch. The wines were good - we bought some - and then we more or less rolled down the hill and back to our guest house. The rain had stopped by now. Back in our room, we ate some nuts and crisps to tide us over until dinner.

Dinner was booked for le Bon Vivant. It was very good - but I was surprised at how empty it was in there, as we'd been told to book well ahead of our visit. Only about 6 tables (less than half) were occupied. The restaurant has a huge glass window into the kitchen so you can see the chef at work. It also has some quirky lightshades, made out of colanders and graters.

Food was good - bread with anchovy spread, an amuse bouche of tomato cream and pancetta. We both had the same starter - goats cheese, gruyere crisps, tomato beignets (like tiny doughnuts) and a glass of tomato consomme. For mains, Roy had loin and belly of pork, with crackling. Jan had karoo lamb. Three pieces - loin, rack and shank (the shank was in a little pastry case) served with mint and mango salsa, and some other sauce (can't remember the details!). It was sooooo good. Karoo lamb is fabulous. They are reared in an area of SA called the Karoo - which is covered in fragrant shrubs and herbs, so that the lambs pick up the flavour in their meat. I had thought that this would be all hype, as people kept going on about how good it was. But wow, it WAS good! For dessert we both had a chocoholic delight - four mini desserts: chocolate fondant, ice cream, mini chocolate roll, brandy snap with ganache. Bottle of La Motte Cabernet Sauvignon. Coffees. All very, very good. And presented beautifully - in fact on my dish there was a garnish that I never quite figured out if I was supposed to eat! It was a leaf of parsley sandwiched between two wafer thin slices of potato (skin still on) and then somehow cooked until crisp but not brown. I decided against eating it, it was too pretty!

On the way out, chef meets you to say good night and ask how you found the food, so we had a little chat with him and headed off home. Bon Vivant was a 10 minute walk from our guest house, which is just as well as there are no taxis in Franschhoek.

The bad news was that I was starting to feel pretty bad by now - and had a weird night. Tossed and turned, ached and shivered. Took 2 paracetomol during the night and spent the rest of the night sweating. Woke up feeling a lot better however I definitely have some form of food poisoning. I will spare you any more details.

Health and nature are conspiring against my perfect and long awaited weekend in Franschhoek. We have booked lunch at the place with the best view in town tomorrow - and the forecast is for rain.

Venturing further afield - the Cape Peninsula

2008-04-18T15:19:00.002+01:00

It is our last day in Cape Town. We planned a day out on the Cape Peninsula.
http://www.safarinow.com/destinations/cape-peninsula/cape-peninsula-map.gif

As predicted by our waiter last night, a "cold front" has moved in. We awoke to thick fog. After breakfast, about 9.30-ish, it had started to lift. We headed out in the car. As we drove through Camp's Bay it was still foggy. Either side of the bay was completely clear! By the time we reached Kalk Bay (via Hout Bay, Chapman's Peak Drive and Fish Hoek) it was hot and sunny again.

Chapman's Peak Drive is beautiful. It even has its own website!
http://www.chapmanspeakdrive.co.za/

Kalk Bay was a nice little place; plenty of antique shops and eating places. We stopped for a look around and a stroll along the harbour where we watched seals swimming around. Then we headed through Simons Town to a place called Boulder's Beach - this is where they have a large colony of African Penguins. We watched for ages - they were so cute and so funny. The best £1.50 I've spent in ages!

Next, we drove right down the Peninsula toward Cape Point (behind several tour buses). We saw baboons and ostrich down there. At the Point, we walked up the STEEP hill to the Lighthouse, dodging a huge group of Italian tourists all the way. They are so noisy and they "hunt in packs" which means they tend to all clamour in the same small place at the same time, and walk 6 wide across the pathways etc. Apologies to any Italians (or italian residents) reading this.

After a quick stop for sandwich and energy bars, we set off on another walk. This time from Cape Point to the Cape of Good Hope - the most south westerly point in Africa. What a stunning walk! Across boardwalks on the cliff edge (and at some places just on the cliff edge itself) to a small hill overlooking the rocks of the Cape of Good Hope. We climbed to the top of the hill (fairly strenous but not too big!) and I placed a stone on the cairn up there for Dad.

This was in total just over an hour circular walk. Got back to the car and drove down to the sea level of the Cape of Good Hope. The waves were crashing on to rocks and spectacular to watch. We then headed home via Scarborough, Misty Cliffs (they were, too) and Kommetje - all very scenic. We had to stop for 10 minutes just out of the Cape Point National Park as a troop of baboon were crossing the road and decided to stop and play in the middle of it.

We finally drove back along Chapman's Peak again and towards home. We stopped at a beach just past Llandudno to watch the sun set. We were lucky to see loads of dassies on the rocks. These are tiny little guinea pig like animals.

Finally got home at 6.30pm. A brilliant day! Exhausted! Dinner is in the Oyo Restaurant at our hotel. We decided to give it a try after enjoying the desserts here so much. Rain is forecast for the next 2 days, and they're even saying that there will be snow in the hills.

Dinner was good - however, we tried a seafood platter, and we've decided that we're just not "seafood" people. Starters: Jan had duck liver pate, morello cherries, raisin toast and Roy had Crab Cake with wasabi mayo and plum dressing. Both were great. We then shared the seafood platter - crayfish, mussels, prawns, tuna, dorado, calamari and three dressings: lemon butter, peri peri and garlic. We decided that we loved the tuna and dorado, but could take or leave the rest. I personally hated the (huge) mussels. Dessert: I had mocha pannacotta, chocolate ice cream and brandy snap basket. Roy had the Pear and Almond tart again. All washed down with lots of Stellenbosch Sauvignon Blanc. Wonderful.

Early to bed again.

Long Walk to Freedom.

2008-04-17T14:10:00.003+01:00

Up at 7. Booked on to the 9am tour to Robben Island and so we have to be there for 8.30am.
It is a beautiful day.

When we got to the "Gateway" museum, there was a room called "Message from Prisoners" so we popped in to have a look. What a moving and well thought out presentation! The room is long and narrow and you stand facing a full screen wall. On the screen they play a film of (life sized) prisoners, singing and talking of what their "crime" had been and where in SA they had been imprisoned during the struggle. So you feel as if they are in front of you in the room. Clever.
http://www.robben-island.org.za/
We managed to fluke being first on to the boat so got a great seat upstairs and therefore grfeat views of Cape Town and Table Mountain as we sailed over to Robben Island. The weather at sea had been described as "moderate" when we arrived at the gateway, but inside the harbour it was like a mill pond. I'd taken my sea legs pills just in case! As soon as we left harbour it changed. Pretty choppy.

Docking at Robben Island you're greeted by a huge concrete pier full of birds and bird shit. It stinks! I guess a combination of birds, fish and guano.

At Robben Island you first of all get on to a coach for a tour around part of the island. The guide tells you the history of the island, and you stop briefly at a few key places - Robert Sobukwe's house, and notably the lime quarry where the political prisoners worked mining lime. It was surprisingly tiny and had a "cave" where they would eat lunch and the current SA leaders planned for the future. We saw a mole snake, ostrich and African penguins as we drove around.

The tour culminates at the Maximum Security Prison where an ex-prisoner takes you to a large communal cell and talks about life on the island and what conditions were like. It's fascinating, but another hour or so with him would have been better as he was so interesting. His crime was to have been a guerilla in Umkhonto we Sizwe - the military wing of the ANC.

After queuing to look at Mandela's cell, we headed back to Cape Town. This time we were not so lucky to get a seat outside on the boat. We stopped for lunch at the Little Mermaid (Beef and chicken baguettes) and then headed back to our room to regroup and plan the rest of the day.

We planned to use the hop on/hop off open topped sightseeing bus around the city but we only hopped off once before deciding that we should hop back on and sit all the way round the route and listen to the commentary and enjoy the sights. We didn't have enough time to properly visit any of the attractions (museums etc) and it was hot and not so pleasant walking round the main streets of Cape Town. We came back to our hotel via Camps Bay and the beach road again, so we got to see what we'd only glimpsed after dark yesterday.

After a shower I dozed in the chair before dinner. We ate at Quay 4. http://www.quay4.co.za/aboutq4.htm
It was just "okay". The menu didn't quite deliver what it promised. I had tempura prawns with fried leeks and curry honey dip. Roy had scallop and kingklip fishcakes with wasabi mayo. For mains I got what was described as roasted baby chicken encrusted with sea salt and served with potato rosti and lemon. What actually turned up was griddled chicken breast with frozen potato shapes. I don't know what happened to the goats cheese and lemon! Roy had swordfish and chips, which just looked ok. We shared a bottle of Boschendal Chenin Blanc. After not being overly impressed with main courses, we decided to walk back to our hotel for dessert and coffee.
I had chocolate truffles (like little pastries filled with chocolate and deep fried) with coconut ice cream. Roy had Pear Tart and ice cream (sharp eyed readers will notice a recurring theme with the pear tart here!). It was very good.

Bed. VERY tired today. I think yesterday's walk is catching up with us!

Long walk to the top of Table Mountain

2008-04-16T13:47:00.000+01:00

The V&A is a very, very good hotel. They really look after you here. Rooms and beds are huge and the bath runs in record time. Choccies left on the pillow at night, plenty of bottled water and a free half bottle of champagne are nice little touches. The maid's room is a few doors down from us so if we're short of coffee or anything we only have to knock and they're happy to supply us. We're drinking a lot of coffee in our room - we're finding ourselves tired (if not jet lagged) and the caffeine helps!

Woke at 7.30am today - great sleep. Breakfast here is really good. There is a cold buffet and I've had a good look round it - there is nothing you can't get! I keep wanting to try one of the oysters (they nestle on a bed of ice next to a huge platter of smoked salmon and an ice bucket of champagne) but at 8am I can't really face it. I generally find myself drawn to the "healthy section" (I know, amazing isn't it!) where I get yogurt, granola and fruit. Then I go back and treat myself to a bran muffin. Or banana bread. Or wonderful brown bread and honey. Occasionally I share some of Roy's "unhealthy" muffin. He is most often drawn to the pastries/muffin section - he found the most incredible custard tarts there! By the time our waitress asks us if we want any hot cooked food, we're stuffed full and decline. I also grab a couple of "Energy Bars" and apples on the way out, to keep with us during the day for emergency snacking.

So, today is the day we climb Table Mountain. Notice I say "climb" and not "walk".

I approached this with a positive attitude and a determination not to let it beat me - I knew it was going to be really tough. My pre-holiday diet/training regime was a pretty poor effort. But I had said that I would walk up Table Mountain and I did.

I think I only slipped up and used negative language (either out loud or in my head) once or twice on the way up. Only a few hundred metres in to our walk up, my head was already thumping and I felt physically sick. I kept myself going by taking frequent rests and plenty of water. And by telling myself that soon, the huge boulders and steep, steep trail, would change to a nice smooth path and a gentler climb. They didn't.

About two thirds up, I was resting when a local guy came past us on his way down. He stopped for a chat and was telling us that he'd set off at about the same time as us, had already been up to the top, had lunch and a good walk round and was now on his way down. In fact, we were constantly being overtaken by fitter walkers. Some of whom were wearing only flip flops!

At no point on the path is there any smooth walkingl. It is 3kms of rocks, boulders and big stones and the trail goes steeply up the Platteklip Gorge.

After a record 4 and a half hour climb (it is supposed to take 1.5 - 3 hours) we finally reached the top. Success! All I could think was "if I can achieve this when I am so unfit, imagine what I could do if I WAS fit".
http://www.tablemountain.net/visitor_info/hiking/platteklip_gorge_to_upper_cable_station.html
At the top, we had our "picnic" of energy bars, apple and bran muffin, and walked around the various viewing points. Our descent was by cable car - thank god it was running today. 4 hours to ascend, 4 minutes to the bottom by cable car.
http://www.tablemountain.net/
We didn't get down until 4pm so decided to take a short drive. First up Signal Hill, for more great views, and then along to Camp's Bay, where we had sundowners in a bar. Back to the hotel along the beach road (Clifton and Seapoint) and arrived there about 7pm.

Dinner tonight was at Baia, a seafood restaurant. Nice place - big comfy seats and we had a window seat on the upstairs terrace, so a good view over the waterfront. We shared calamari in garlic sauce to start. Then Jan had Kingklip (fish) with pesto, mediterranean veggies and tomato rice. Roy had Kingklip with chorizo, potato, veggies and rice. I had cherry and pecan cheesecake and Roy had Pear, ginger and almond tart with honeycomb ice cream. Bottle of Graham Beck Sauvingnon Blanc. Excellent.

We rounded the evening off by watching the seals fighting on a jetty in front of the Table Bay Hotel - quite funny! So noisy and argumentative. Then we strolled back to the hotel - slept soundly tonight after the day's exertions!

Tuesday 15th April - Cape Town

2008-04-15T08:00:00.000+01:00

We had an easy drive from the airport to the Victoria and Alfred Holtel - the sun by now is shining and it's very warm. We had been concerned when we noticed the South African travellers all getting off the plane in big winter coats!

Our room is lovely. Spacious, comfortable. I'm currently sitting in an easy chair reading about the V&A Waterfront and listening to African singers in the piazza outside. I also just heard the Noon Gun go off - it's fired from Signal Hill each day.
http://www.vahotel.co.za/home.htm

We ventured out arund the waterfront to find out where things are - there are plentiful shops and restaurants here. We looked at some menus and were drawn into the Greek Fisherman for lunch, our first taste of SA food and hospitality. We didn't want to over do it so we got greek salad, hummous and taramasalata with a loaf of Greek Peasant bread. Oh and two glasses of Castle beer .http://www.greekfisherman.co.za/menu.htm
Everything was delicious. Roy was feeling tired so after a stroll round we had an hour back in the room and he had a short nap. At 5pm we ventured out again and booked into Den Anker restaurant for dinner. We found a group of seals lying (and being noisy) on a jetty so we watched them for a while. We ogled some more at Table Mountain - it's so beautiful as a back drop to the Waterfront. It is in the high 70's, temperature wise. Just perfect.

Dinner was excellent. Both had fillet steak (Roy au poivre, Jan with Bearnaise) and it was very good indeed. Bottle of Shiraz. Roy had a pear and almond tart and Jan had cheesecake. Followed by the strongest Irish coffees ever! They made them at the table, and lit the whisky first. Very dramatic. http://www.denanker.co.za/

Home to bed.

Great Expectations

2008-04-14T08:38:00.003+01:00

Woke up at 7 this morning thinking: every day will be an adventure for the next 24 days. How often in my life do I get to say that?

The philosophical amongst you might think that every day is an adventure regardless of where it is spent! However, this trip to South Africa has been long in the planning, cancelled once, and is finally here.

Woo hoooooo.............

It was a long, dull morning! We were packed and ready to go by 11. Taxi was booked for 1.
Arrived at Leeds airport just before 2 and were stung at check in for £21 excess baggage fee for being a mere 3kg overweight - normally that would be ignored. *insert swear word directed at BMI check in staff here*

No extra baggage allowance or lounge access for Leeds - London because our flight tickets were economy saver fares. I wish I'd cottoned on to that when I booked - very frustrating as our baggage allowance is an extra 10kg EACH for the London - Cape Town segment.

All smooth at Heathrow (phew) and we spent most of our 5 hours there in the Baobab lounge (South African Airways lounge). I asked for a glass of Amarula (Bailey's like South African drink) and got a vase full! Met a nice American couple who were flying on to Cape Town albeit by a more complex route than us, and chatting with them passed an hour on nicely. Boarded and departed bang on time.

I was excited about the flight (I'm not usually!) because we were travelling business class and this was a first for me on long haul.
Benefits of travelling business class:
- priority baggage (off loading)
- priority boarding and exiting plane
- unlimited wine, champagne, port, well - anything alcoholic really
- good food (proper plates and cutlery, apart from plastic knife. I'm sure I could do more damage with a fork than a knife)
- seats that convert in to lie flat beds for sleeping (and other various positions)
- no swollen feet due to said lie flat beds
- superb service
- duvet and pillow
- cute Delsey vanity pack

Disadvantages of travelling business class:
- unlimited wine, champagne, port, alcohol

I woke up on the plane with a stinking headache! When your glass is constantly being refilled you don't notice quite how much you're drinking.

Anyway, for a change, we both slept well on the flight and felt pretty refreshed when our steward woke us for breakfast with ice cold, refreshing orange juice. Flying into Cape Town is an experience right up there. Table Mountain loomed out of low clouds. Stunning. Still felt like I was looking at pictures on the internet though.

Through security and baggage in no time. Our car hire was upgraded to an Outlander 4WD. Swartberg Pass here we come! And I'm going to start a new entry on the blog now as it is officially 15th April...........

South Africa trip - itinerary

2008-04-08T22:18:00.002+01:00

April 15th to April 18th: Cape Town
http://www.vahotel.co.za/home.htm

April 19th and April 20th: Franschoek
http://www.aka.co.za/vreugde.htm

April 21st and April 22nd: Wildnerness (Garden Route)
http://www.thedune.co.za/

April 23rd and April 24th: Plettenberg Bay (Garden Route)
http://www.fynbosridge.co.za/index.html

April 25th, 26th and 27th: Kwandwe Game Reserve
http://www.ccafrica.com/reserve-1-id-2-8

April 28th and April 29th: Addo Elephant Park
http://www.elephanthouse.co.za/

April 30th: Fly to Durban, Itinerary from Auntie Margaret as follows:

April 30th - Wednesday Collect J & R. Braai (Barbecue) with family at Kloof
May 1st - Thursday Tour Durban and surrounds
May 2nd - Friday Chill Out (maybe shopping??)
May 3rd - Saturday a. m. Midlands Meander drive
p.m. Overnight at Moorcroft Manor

May 4th - Sunday 4x4 trip over Sani Pass. Overnight at Gail's house
May 5th - Monday Boer war battlefields. Overnight at Dundee
May 6th - Tuesday Zulu battlefields, then home to Kloof

May 7th - Wednesday Morning at Kloof, fly home in afternoon/evening.

A spooky coincidence

2008-04-06T18:50:00.002+01:00

I have yet to report on our recent trips to Horsham, Maidstone and Canterbury - I will catch up on that soon. However, I wanted to mention something that happened this weekend. I've been spending a bit of time thinking "I wonder what was happening this time last year" - and thank god for my blog which is there to remind me exactly what was going on. I'd never recall it all. So, Dad has been on my mind a lot lately.

Yesterday the postman brought a marketing leaflet from the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall - I'm on their mailing list now. I like to look through as it's all about "What's On" and they have some pretty good stuff on there. This leaflet was for April - September 08.

Last time my Dad was able to go out (socially) before he became ill and subsequently bed bound, was in late January when I took him to a concert at the Phil. It was the Wally Fields Jazz Orchestra playing Rhapsody in Blue and a selection of jazz classics from people like Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw - Dad loved jazz. Although it was a struggle for him, he made a huge effort and came with me. I'd bought the ticket for his birthday, which is in September and we'd had a long wait for the actual concert in January. I guess I should have known something pretty serious was wrong with Dad because he let me drive him there and back and he NEVER let anybody else drive him around! He couldn't walk far and so I dropped him at the door and then ran out to get the car when it finished and picked him up at the entrance, too. I also remember, and this may be on my blog, seeing Dad from a distance when I came back from the loo during the interval, and just thinking that something was wrong with him - he had that "look" about him, round the mouth.

Anyway, we had a good night. I drove home afterwards as I was up earlyish the next day to go to London to meet some friends.

So, back to yesterday. I opened the leaflet and noticed that the Wally Fields Jazz Orchestra was back on at the Phil. With exactly the same programme as last January. The date? 28th September. Dad's birthday.

http://www.liverpoolphil.com/eventdetail.aspx?Event_ID=1629

Easter Weekend

2008-03-24T10:19:00.002Z

I have to say I've breathed a sigh of relief at being "off the road" for a few days. Was getting tired of travelling and being in the car. It all starts again on Tuesday though!

On Good Friday we headed over to Mum's (with Lillie and Albert) to
a) try to fix Mum's internet connection and get her online, and
b) take everybody for lunch at the Pheasant Inn.

Did not succeed in fixing the connection. I've no idea what the problem is - thought I knew, but have failed to fix things. This means Mum is still offline which is getting to be a problem for her.

Lunch was ok - we had a 40 minute wait for a table. This was made worse by Albert's constant pacing around looking for a table and trying to cajole the waitresses into seating us! Once we did sit down, the service was pretty fast - and the food was ok. Not as good as last time.... isn't that always the way?

Then we called in at Cheshire Oaks outlet mall - Mum fancied a look around. Albert and Lillie were headed back to the car within minutes of getting out of it! In fact, we'd only been into one shop. So we rushed around a few others and then back to the car and home. I felt a bit bad for Mum as I think she'd have liked a walk round, but when you know that people are waiting it makes you feel uncomfortable. Maybe it was a bad call to take my in laws over there on Friday.

Saturday and Sunday we did very little. I did some shopping on Saturday after my facial (my new treat!) and then cooked a nice dinner of Lamb Kleftico. Followed by fruit. We made up the lost calories in wine and liquers, though.

Sunday we had a long walk round Temple Newsam (it had snowed but pretty much melted by the time we got out) and then came home to watch tv and generally slob around. Oh, and update my Blog for the Scotland trip.

Now it is Monday and I'm tidying the office (again) and getting ready for the week ahead - lots of travelling - to Reigate and then Canterbury so we're away all week. Need to get the big suitcase out!

A message to you.....

2008-03-13T15:46:00.003Z

It is a year ago today that Dad came home from hospital, after his 6 week stay there. Last night, my sister (Lorraine) and my mum went to see a Spirit Medium, David Traynor, at a hotel in Widnes.

http://www.davidtraynor.com/

Lorraine wrote up what happened and so I'm posting it here (as despite being an authorised contributor to this Blog she's had very little to say for herself thus far). Only kidding, Lol! LOL!

A message from Dad
An evening with Spirit Medium – David Traynor
Hillcrest Hotel – Wed 12th March 2008.
Since we lost Dad I have become increasingly curious and intrigued by the whole concept of people who have the ability to make connections with loved ones that have passed over. I persuaded mum to come along with me to see David Traynor. I had not heard anything about him – I just saw an advert in the local paper and as I often tune into Colin Fry’s TV show Sixth Sense I thought I would go along and see if this area was as fascinating as it appeared to be. David's website had a guest book where the majority of people had posted positive messages about their experience so I decided to go along and decide for myself.
The introduction was very light hearted and David was quite amusing and quite camp! The thing that impressed me was that he went direct to people – he did not say things like does the name Bill mean anything to anyone etc. He also asked people to just answer yes or no to what he was telling them – he refused to take any additional detail.
During the first half of the evening he made about 4 connections and 2 of them were very accurate to the people involved.
At first I was not going along expecting to hear from dad but as the evening went on you can’t help but envy the people getting messages and hope that you get one albeit you are not quite sure how you will react if you do.
During the second half of the evening David was trying to get through a lot more people. He was struggling with the first lady but then the next 3 were really interesting and accurate.
He then went to a lady sat behind me and was describing a man she did not know (nor did we by the way) then he started to talk about someone having a camera down the throat to find stomach cancer and he kept repeating this to the lady behind us but she said no it did not mean anything to her. He also asked if there was a connection to someone in re-education/learning etc. He then said he needed to come to me (I was so nervous my heart was racing but I told myself to focus!) Mum was biting her nails furiously!!!
I should point out here that David said the reason he was jumping between me and the lady behind us was because the spirits realised he was running out of time and were all trying to get their say in (hee hee sounds like Dad!!)
He asked me if the comments re the camera and the stomach cancer meant anything to me and I simply said yes. He then relayed the following and I can’t be accurate about the order of what was said but the content is correct.
This gentleman was misdiagnosed 18 months prior to being correctly diagnosed (Mum said this was correct – I assume this was referring to dad being diagnosed with diabetes).
This gentleman had cancer in his stomach area and it just ate away at him and he became a sorry sight (this was something that used to upset us all but mum used that phrase on occasions and found it particularly hard to see).
He said that we kept what was wrong with him a secret at first because we knew he would worry and he thanks us for this – he said it was kind of us.
David then referred back to the comments re education. At first he was asking if someone was going back to study or learning computers etc. I said no. Then he asked Dad to repeat himself and he said it was someone doing a degree – I said yes and he said they will do well and get a 2:1 masters and he is really really proud of them. (Well done Joe!)
Then he said that the gentleman said he was ok.
He then asked to be passed to mum and told her he felt he had a fatherly figure with her – we thought at this point it may be my granddad (mums dad) but he went on to say this gentleman says he was a good man and lived a good decent life, he repeated he was a good man – we knew this was dad as although Grandad was also a good man it was a term frequently used by people to describe dad.
He asked mum if she had connections with various names: Dorothy, William/Bill, Margaret, Fred – he described Fred and said he was with this man and was "our Fred" – we are not sure if this was mums cousin – a bit sketchy but… He also described that our Fred had died after a long illness connected with his lungs and then heart. This is true.
He then went on to say he was leaving the spirits love with us, he was ok and he says to mum "keep well" and was sending healing messages through for her problems. He said that he "didn't believe in this kind of stuff" when he was alive. This is also true.
Can’t explain how this felt, it was comforting to say the least and strengthens my belief in life after death in the form of the spirit world – to summarise I think Dad was validating who he was when describing the stomach cancer etc and had come through just to say he was ok and was watching over mum.
PS – David returned to the woman behind us and said some things that could have also been dad but as she was confirming what was said I decided I was being greedy thinking this but just for the record the points were:
This person was confused near the end and was given drugs to help him sleep and stop the confusion
This person drifted in and out of consciousness for a couple of days prior to passing
There was a December anniversary – 15th/16th (Mum met dad on 5th)
There were 3 people with him when he passed (I was convinced by this until she said and 2 people arrived late which meant something to the lady behind me)
Another message that was getting passed from us to the other family was a connection to under the stairs! Someone hiding there when scared???

Heading back to England

2008-03-09T08:57:00.004Z

Another early start - we had finished breakfast, packed and got out by 9am. Well - it's early for a Sunday! We headed first up to see the Twelve Apostles - a prehistoric stone circle just outside of Dumfries. As with most stone circles (Stonehenge excepted) it was fairly dull. According to online research it is the seventh largest in Britain. Now I'm wondering what and where the others are as I've only seen Stonehenge and Avebury.

Maybe they aren't so dull after all if I am seriously considering googling "Stone Circles". Or maybe I'm just sad.

Anyway, after the Stone Circle we headed over to Lochmaben, a small town just north of England. Roy was there last May on a lad's golfing trip and said it was a nice place. There are about 5 lochs around the town so we walked around the largest - Castle Loch. The weather was cold and sunny at times. I was so glad to have my 99p woolly hat to keep my ears warm! Once we got past Lochmaben Castle, the ground turned a bit boggy. We were walking over tussocks and every now and then my foot would sink right into a deep puddle. Not great when you're wearing mesh trainers! Not sure how we managed to forget the walking boots!

As we crossed the tussocks, a flock of geese flew overhead. Loudly. We heard them miles off and stood and watched as they honked over us - and back again. Not sure where they were headed but they were making a long way round out of it, that's for sure!

Back in Lochmaben, we had a drink at the pub Roy stayed in, as he wanted to see John, the owner. After a chat with John, we decided to head home. We drove through Lockerbie, which looked like a nice town, and then on to the motorway. I wanted to see Gretna Green (I've never been there) so we stopped off on the way home. Hmmm, not sure I'd ever do that again - what a money making touristy horrible place it is! It looks more like a theme park. I think it must be an awful place to get married. And you have to pay to go in and look at the Blacksmith's place and anvil. We didn't bother. They do, however, have a wonderful food hall there, selling all kinds of gorgeous and unusual food stuffs. We bought scones and jam to have when we got home.

Finally arrived home at 4-ish. I really enjoyed exploring the South West corner of Scotland - it's given me a taste to explore the rest of it - one day.

My only issue with Scotland is that they have such awful and ugly social housing - I know there are some bad places in England but the Scots win the prize for creating some of the most mind blowingly shocking houses and maisonettes. I think they would even beat some of the Eastern bloc countries.

Dumfries and surrounding areas - in the rain

2008-03-08T20:23:00.003Z

Woke up early and enjoyed a great breakfast in the B&B (porridge and scrambled eggs). We headed out at 9 for a walk around Dumfries town... Robbie Burns spent the last years of his life in Dumfries and so there is a lot of "Burns" stuff around - his house, his mausoleum, a museum and statues of both him and his wife. It started to rain quite soon and so we headed into a shopping mall to stay dry. It was there I got the best buy of my weekend - a woolly hat costing 99p. Over the next 2 days I was so glad of this purchase!

Unless you're fanatical about Burns (I'm not) there isn't a lot to do in Dumfries itself, and so we headed out in the car. We stopped at a town called Castle Douglas - which was rather nice. One big High Street with not a chain shop in sight. We wandered around the various shops and galleries until settling on a nice cafe for lunch. Needless to say, as soon as we sat indoors the sun came out and was cracking the flags until we left there to go back to the car. Then it rained again. We decided to drive along the Solway Firth (huge water inlet coming off the Irish Sea) and it was pretty scenic. We found some gorgeous windy roads to tootle along and occasionally the sun would come out and it would be lovely. Proof of the changeable weather is on the pictures.

After driving about all afternoon we got back to Dumfries at tea time and had a chill out in our room before going out. We had booked a table at Casa Mia, an Italian restaurant a short drive from our B&B. There isn't much in Dumfries (in terms of nice places to eat). The restaurant was good - apart from them trying twice to overcharge us on the bill.

You take the high road and I'll take the wrong road...

2008-03-07T17:40:00.002Z

I was working in Motherwell on Friday 7th March so we decided to make the most of it and stay up in Scotland for the weekend. We arrived early and had chance for a look around Motherwell. It's a smallish town and fairly typical of many British towns today - full of cheap shops (i.e. selling cheap stuff) and charity shops. Nothing is "individual" any more, most shops are chains and there is almost always a McDonalds. Which is where we ate breakfast - there wasn't really anywhere else that had a free table and looked remotely decent.

After the meeting finished (about 12.45ish) I got back to the car and Roy had planned a route for us. His plan was to take us across to Ayr and then down into Dumfries - we'd decided to base ourselves in Dumfries for the weekend, as it's got a good choice of things to do around and about and is not too far from "England" which meant the drive home wouldn't be too long.

The day was foul - rainy and windy and grey. We drove across to Ayr anyway, and by the time we arrived the rain had stopped but the wind was fearsome! Ayr town centre looked quite nice but we didn't stop until we reached the promenade... we got out of the car to look at the sea. It was a struggle to stand up - even the seagull seemed to be suspended motionless in the air, unable to fly through the wind. So I took a couple of pictures and jumped back in the car. The one here is attempting to capture the static seagulls!

We drove down the coast through Turnberry where Roy was excited to see the Golf Course. Turnberry was like a full sized model village - no real soul to the place, everything was white and purpose built to provide a luxury golfing environment I guess. We stopped just after it for a coffee and sandwich at a roadside cafe over looking Ailsa Crag - which apparently is famous, if you watch the British Open.

We started to head inland - we'd found the road we wanted on a map, but unfortunately we missed it. Still not sure how. Anyway, we ended up driving right through the beautiful Galloway Forest, so apart from a few anxious moments about whether it actually would come out anywhere (as we got further and further away from any sign of human life!) it was a great drive. I have never been through a "working" forest and so it was fascinating to see the tree growth, planting and of course huge areas of felled trees. This area is known as the "highlands of the lowlands". Looking across the forest to the hills, I could see why. Regrettably I couldn't capture this very well on camera.

After a long afternoon driving (through the most pretty villages and scenery) we finally arrived in Dumfries at 5.30pm. We headed straight to the Torbay Lodge Bed and Breakfast. We hadn't booked it, but it had good reviews on the internet. Roy popped in and we were lucky enough to bag the last room for the weekend! It was very good - clean, well appointed and best of all, a good powerful shower. We got showered and changed and headed off into Dumfries. The B&B owner had suggested a pub called the Cavens Arms to eat. We had about a 30 minute wait for a table - it was packed - but that was fine. It was good pub grub - I think we both had some version of beef stew and it was tasty and inexpensive. After that we had a nightcap in the Robert the Bruce pub up the road (a Wetherspoons!) and headed for an early night. The room was lovely and warm and the beds really comfy.

http://www.torbaylodge.co.uk/

Mother's Day and an excess of cream!

2008-03-04T21:42:00.002Z

We had mum over for Mother's Day. In fact, unusually, she agreed to stay for a long weekend - Thursday to Monday, instead of her usual Friday - Sunday.

So I planned my menus with care!
On Thursday I made penne pasta with white wine, cream, lemon, dill and smoked salmon.
Friday was roast chicken, salad and jacket potatoes - not TOO bad.
Saturday I recreated my Valentine Steak meal for mum, and made Creme Brulee for dessert. I am pleased to report that I finally got the Creme to cook just perfectly!
On Sunday we had Roy's parents over for lunch and I made a Lancashire Hot Pot, followed by Sticky Toffee Pudding and cream. I am going to boast now, and say that my Sticky Toffee Pudding is the best I've ever eaten... of course, the recipe is out of a book (Prue Leith's Cookery Bible) but there must be some skill in the making? ;-)

I dread to imagine the calories in those 4 day's eating.... but it is now Tuesday and we're back on track.

But still suffering gymphobia.

Beautiful Bolton Abbey

2008-02-24T22:46:00.003Z

Today we took a walk at Bolton Abbey. I don't think I've been here since I lived in Saltaire, and yet it is a wonderful part of Yorkshire.

We arrived at 11am, and walked until about 1.25pm which is not bad going. We followed the river along to an area called The Strid - a place where the land narrows and the river has to squeeze through it. The couple in the picture had nicked the only viewing seat!

Then we turned back and stopped for a sandwich and coffee at the Tea House in Bolton Abbey Village. Finally, we drove through Appletreewick and Burnsall and then up Greenhow Hill into Pateley Bridge - then across to Ripon and home down the A1.

The greatest stressbuster - being out in the fresh air of the Yorkshire Dales.

Note: I have been trying for a week to attach photos to this blog but it keeps crashing! So I will publish anyway and add the pics when I can. Yay! Pbotos are up! (13th April 2008)

Valentine's Dinner - just a bit late!

2008-02-23T23:34:00.005Z

Tonight we stayed in and I cooked our belated "Valentine's Dinner". I have to say, I admire those cooks on Masterchef who turn out stunning three course meals in 2 hours or less. It took me about 3 and a half hours to put this lot together:

Starter: Goat cheese and walnut salad with raspberry vinegar dressing

Main course: Fillet steak with mushroom, shallot and red wine sauce. Served with sauteed spinach and dauphinnoise potatoes (got to be the best potato dish in the world!)

Pud: Rhubarb, poached in ginger beer topped with polenta and almond crumble. Two pics - one before the (home made) custard, and a splash of poaching liquor got poured all over it!

Recipe for the pud was courtesy of the Great British Menu cookbook. I'd seen it made on the tv show and thought it looked good. It was. There was a ton of crumble topping left over so I grilled some sliced pear on a griddle pan the following evening and served it with the leftover custard! Recipe follows........

For the crumble topping:
50g/2oz blanched almonds
60g/2½oz plain flour
40g/1¾oz polenta (medium ground)
50g/2oz caster sugarpinch salt
2 drops pure vanilla extract
75g/2¾oz chilled unsalted butter, chopped

For the rhubarb:
200ml/7fl oz ginger wine (I could not find this so used good quality ginger beer)
75g/2¾oz light soft brown sugar
strip of pared orange zest
250g/9oz young pink rhubarb, cut into 2.5cm/1in batons

Method:
For the crumble topping, toast the almonds by tossing them in a heavy pan over a medium heat. Chop finely and mix with the flour, polenta, sugar, salt and vanilla extract. Rub in the chilled butter. Spread out the crumble on a baking tray and chill for about 30 minutes. (Chilling will firm up the crumble so that it will be crisper when baked.)
Preheat the oven to 140C/285F/Gas 1.5.
Bake the crumble for 40 minutes.
Remove from the oven, allow to cool and then crumble into pieces with your hands. Set aside.

For the rhubarb, gently heat the ginger wine with the sugar and orange zest in a large, shallow pan until the sugar has dissolved. Add the rhubarb pieces and poach gently for 3-4 minutes or until soft.
Leave the rhubarb to cool in the liquid, then drain the rhubarb thoroughly.

To serve, stand an individual chefs' ring for each crumble on a plate or in a wide, rimmed bowl (the ring should be about 7.5cm/3in in diameter and 3.5cm/11/4in deep). Pack in pieces of rhubarb until the ring is nearly full. Add a generous sprinkling of crumble, before removing the ring.

And yes, I did buy a set of chef's rings yesterday in Tesco. They are my favourite new toy!

In memory of Stuart Victor Evans, 1967-2007

2008-02-23T10:41:00.002Z

Stuart Evans is my Mum's cousin's son. That would make him my third cousin, or something! However, Mum's cousin (Uncle Len) was more like a brother to her and that is why we call him Uncle Len.

Len was married to Chris, and they had two children - Stuart and Angie. Chris died in her 30's, of liver cancer, and Len then met and married Ann, a lady with twin daughters, Janet and Helen.

Still with me?

Len and his family have been around all of my life. We spent some holidays with them in Hampshire, when his work in HM Customs took him down south for some years. I can remember going to visit them when they moved back up North, to Formby. I vaguely remember being a bit scared of Auntie Chris cos she made us take our shoes off to go in the house! After Chris died, my mum would have them over for lunch on Sundays.

Len's father - Joe - was my Nana's brother. A lovely man. Unfortunately, he lost his wife, Alice, to whom he was devoted, quite early in life. Alice died of lung cancer in her 50's. Uncle Joe lived alone from then, and used to spend weekends with our family in Rainhill. Uncle Joe was good fun and always had a smile on his face and a tale to tell. I can still smell his roll-up ciggies now! He had a sharp brain and would spend hours trying to teach me how to do cryptic crosswords. I never did get it. He and Mum would play Scrabble together until the early hours. If I ever joined in, I'd usually get beaten, and more often I'd just get fed up because they were SO competitive and would never let anything "illegal" go. Picture the scene: Mum's dining table, the Scrabble Board (deluxe version, of course) a couple of wine glasses, a brimming ashtray and a giant Collins English Dictionary. Happy memories.

Uncle Joe died in about 1996. He'd moved to live with Len before he died, once he got older and a bit frail.

That is Stuart's family... part of my family.

Stuart died in December last year. It was sudden and shocking. He had moved, years ago, to live in Coventry and when Len and Angie could not get in contact with him by telephone, they contacted his friend who could also not get an answer when he called at the house. The police were contacted (Angie is a police officer) and Stuart was found dead in his home. He'd had a massive duodenal ulcer which had burst. Len, Ann and Angie are devastated.

Stuart was cremated in Coventry just after Christmas, and yesterday, we went to his memorial service and scattering of his ashes in Liverpool. The service was short, but poignant. His sister, Angie, read a beautiful tribute. I was surprised by two things: how she had the courage to read out such a personal eulogy in front of us all, and how very close she and her brother were. But then, I never knew Stuart (or Angie really) as an adult. Last I remember of him is as a georgeous (and slightly bratty) kid with platinum blonde curly hair.

Sleep peacefully, Stuart.

Catching up and feeling insecure

2008-02-20T13:32:00.002Z

More blog news: I have finally written up my holiday notes from the Maldives last year. To read them, click on 2007 and September. It'll be obvious which are my holiday blogs - they all say something along the lines of: ate, sunbathed, snorkelled, ate, drank, slept. But there are nice pics to cheer you up on a Winter day.

The company I work for are known for being "hire and fire" merchants. Recently they've made two people redundant - neither of whom had worked there for very long. And so it kind of makes me nervous. I know that there is little security in any job today, but I really would like to get at least another 12 months in doing this job.

So, it is frosty and sunny and I'm going for a walk now with my new camera (and Roy). It's my lunchtime. Just in case you were thinking I'm skiving.

A wonderful new foodie find

2008-02-16T21:15:00.003Z

We've been away for a few days, staying at Mum's house. On Friday she had to go in to hospital (the dreaded Warrington Hospital) for a cardioversion procedure to "cure" her atrial fibrillation.

So we went over on Thursday afternoon as I'd been working in Manchester all morning. As we arrived, Mum was just walking out of her building to go to the hairdressers. Do you know it made me really sad to see her coming down the corridor on her own. Didn't seem right. I know that sounds daft, but usually I am with Mum and not watching her going about her normal business alone.

The good news is that the Cardioversion worked and mum's heart rate is now back to normal. She had this done about 4 years ago and it worked then, but the Consultant thinks that the stress of last year may have caused it to kick back to an irregular rythym. That spelling of rythym doesn't look right to me but I can't figure out how the spell checker on this blog works.

So, whilst I was at the hospital with Mum, Roy was decorating Emily's bedroom. It's pink and silver! Very cool paper - fuschia pink leaves on a silver backing. But that's only on one wall, so it doesn't look too overpowering. He's done a nice job, got the wall papered and all the other walls and wood work painted.

Actually I'm fibbing a bit about being at the hospital all day with Mum - they wouldn't let me wait with her in the morning and so I went shopping into the new Mall in Warrington. I got a load of tops for my hols in the sales and a few other bits and pieces.
The nurse said I could go and sit with Mum after 12.30, until she could come home. They finally did the last ECG and released her at about 3.30pm.

Today was lovely - bright and sunny - and so we took Mum out for a run into Cheshire to a pub I'd heard of and wanted to try.
http://www.thepheasantinn.co.uk/welcome.html

It was very good. Excellent food and spectacular views. I know it was sunny but I did think that the people sitting outside with drinks were pushing it a bit! The temperature was about 2 degrees!

So we decided to book a night there in July for our wedding anniversary. Not on the anniversary itself (that weekend is the anniversary of Dad's death and I want to get Mum over here then) but on 12th July. Same day as racing at Chester so we plan to have a nice day at the races and then an evening at the Pheasant Inn.

Well here we are home again, tired and cold (our boiler keeps breaking down so when we got here there was no heating on).

A new Germ Buster record

2008-02-12T10:08:00.000Z

Well last night I beat my all time Germ Buster record score - I got 1330, previous best was 904. So I feel it maybe time to retire as Germ Buster Champ of our house. Well, actually, the only Germ Buster player in our house.

I've updated my blog for our holiday in Wales last year - go to 2007, 14th - 20th July if you're interested. The blogging bit wasn't the problem, but the photos take ages to upload. There must be a quicker way?

Diet update: Well, since abandoning Slimming World for "Low Fat, Low GI", as I suspected, the control has slipped somewhat. I need a structure of counting or limiting food, I feel. Having a rethink. We haven't been eating badly, but almost certainly eating more than when we were on SW. I'll ponder on this and let you know what we decide.

A pet hate and my favourite fast food

2008-02-08T13:33:00.000Z

I spend a lot of time online and in particular, on a couple of internet communities.

One of the trends that I dislike is this concept of calling everybody "hun" or "hunny" (ugh, it makes me shudder) and falling in love with everybody within hours of "meeting" them online.
When I say "falling in love" I don't mean in the romantic sense, but some people have this way of forming strong emotional attachments to online friends really quickly.

I don't tend to see it on most of the sites I use, but I think it's very much a trend for younger people. It drives me crackers. So I just thought I'd mention it.

I have visited a lot of online cooking blogs and some of them are amazing. Fabulous recipes, and even better photographs. So I've decided to try my new camera out and take some food porn pics. It's tricker than you'd think.

In the picture is my frittata (last night's dinner). Fresh out of the pan - in fact you can see the steam rising out of it!

I usually serve this with a more substantial salad but all I had in were tomatoes. I had to crop the pic as the plate was resting on the cooker top, and it looked a bit grubby in close up! Despite only having been cleaned yesterday.

Ingredients: Eggs, Mushroom, Courgette, Onion, Spinach, Red Pepper, Cheddar cheese.

Moving to a different diet

2008-02-03T22:06:00.000Z

Well, Slimming World has been useful in getting us back on the right track, but I feel we have to move on. Mainly because of lunchtimes. It's a nightmare not being able to take a sandwich - which is simple and easy to make and transport and eat!

I'm not up for faffing about with salads or flasks of soup. I know that sounds pathetic, but that's how it is just now.

Soooo... we're moving to the GI Diet. Not exactly South Beach but pretty much the same! Except I want to take some of the low fat principles I used on Slimming World and apply them here, as I've been guilty of doing "low GI - high fat" in the past.

I still have not got to the gym. I promised I was going today - as it's the start of our 10 week countdown to the South Africa trip. And I'm determined I'll be fit enough to do lots of walking.
In fact, I spent far too much time this weekend researching South Africa on line and in books. Maybe an hour away from that and at the gym would have been a better use of time.

On a positive note, I've done my tax return (all bar some info I need to phone and get from my ex-employer tomorrow), sorted my paperwork in the office, and cooked up a whole load of healthy food!

It started with a latte.....

2008-02-01T12:50:00.000Z

I have to report 2 "iffy" days this week, diet wise.

It all started with a latte. On Tuesday I went to meet a colleague at a hotel in Birmingham. At 12 noon. I ordered coffee when I got there - large latte for her, regular coffee for me. They bought us two large lattes. Instead of sending it back (well the girl who served us seemed a bit educationally sub-normal, and I'm not being nasty here but I'd have felt mean telling her she'd screwed up our order. Oh plus I'm the passive aggressive type anyway by nature) I drank it. After adding 3 large sugars.

So the latte itself would have made a meal, and then Jackie (my colleague) says "I'm starving, shall we order lunch?". I agreed, and instead of looking for soup or salad, which really is about the best option for SW, I ordered a prawn mayo sandwich. Not TOO bad, I'm thinking.... but then ate the crisps that came with it. Well, some of them.

I carried on "as normal" that night, so at least I didn't blow it completely. Next day was a different story though.

I went to Aberdeen for the day. Oh - and I apologise to Aberdeen for calling it a shit-tip on my last visit. This time I was right in the City centre and it's rather nice. I digress. I didn't have time for breakfast at home so I had a coffee and a cereal bar in the airport. Then on the flight they offered us "snacks". I had an apple juice and another cereal bar.... one that was covered in chocolate. So far, so bad. Well not great, anyway. I studiously avoided the biscuits at my meeting and afterwards went to Caffe Nero and ordered a tuna/cheese panini, cappucino AND a seed/cranberry muffin. It's getting worse, isn't it? At the airport coming back I ate 2 ginger biscuits with a coffee. And a small packet of crisps on the flight. Then I got home, at 8.30-ish and made 2 rounds of cheese on toast.

My point, aside from how easy it is to lapse, is how easy it is NOT to eat fruit and veg! Shocking!

On Thursday I was back on track and tried to address the fruit/veg shortfall from the day before.

Aside from that I cannot get over my mental block about going to the gym. More on that another time.

Body Dysmorphia!

2008-01-27T21:05:00.000Z

I don't know if I have mentioned this, but I think I have a touch of body dysmorphia.
Not the type where I think I'm fat/ugly but the type where I actually think that I look thinner than I really am.
I was on a course just before Christmas - on presentation skills - and we were filmed so that we could look at how we present to an audience. When they played the film back, rather than critique my presentation technique (I thought I was rather good, actually!) I spent the whole time cringing at how enormous I was! When I get dressed and look in my mirror, I see a large but "ok" person. On the tv screen (ok so it was wide screen) I looked MASSIVE. And my face! I looked like a doughboy.

Anyway, not to labour on it, because I am addressing this situation, but I wanted to record it for posterity, should I be tempted not to eat sensibly! If I had balls, I'd upload some footage of the DVD that the course instructors kindly gave me to bring home. But I think that is a step too far.

We were chatting about doughboys today. When we were kids, my nana would make us dough and we'd spend ages at the dining table playing with it. We'd make teddies, and "dough boys" as my nan called them. Dumpy looking shapes, with eyes punched out with matchsticks. Ah, the nostalgia! No need for fancy games when you've got imagination and a nana who'll make you a lump of dough.

Mum has been here for the weekend. Having her here on her own is starting to feel a bit more "normal". We had a nice time.

So, one week of The Diet is complete. It's gone well. Of course I didn't get weighed at the outset so I can't report progress in numbers to you. But I'll try a suit on tomorrow and see if it's fitting any better.

I do feel better for eating well. Next I need to tackle my gymphobia. I wish I could get back in that mindset of loving the gym and wanting to go all the time.

Instead, I find a series of highly inventive excuses (not) to avoid it. They include:
"I've got work to finish"
"I need to clean up"
"I have to make dinner"

Spot the smokescreen.

p.s. I hit my record of 572 on Germ Buster tonight!

Replacing one addiction with another...

2008-01-24T00:25:00.000Z

Gosh it seems ages since I sat here after midnight blogging. Used to be my "quiet" time when Dad was ill, and after Mum had gone to bed.

I should be in bed by now but I've been otherwise occupied. Roy got a Nintendo DS Lite game for Christmas and I've (sadly) becoming addicted to the Germ Buster game on the Brain Training card. Now, I know that sitting playing Germ Buster is better than sitting eating chocolate, but isn't this just replacing one addiction with another, LOL?

The basic rules are you have to kill germs with pills by lining up four of the same coloured dots. As soon as you place one pill on the screen (dragging it with the pen) then another appears. You're "dead" if you pile up too many pills without killing the germs. When I first started I was scoring about 7-10 points per game (on easy mode!). Tonight I hit my all time record of 450.

But, I've just googled Germ Buster and was gutted to see people boasting of scores of 1172 on "hard" mode. So I have a long way to go. I don't know if I can let my addiction reach that level. The irony is that Germ Buster is supposed to relax your brain after Brain Training. But it winds me up. I think it's getting to me - today on the motorway I found myself (driving a black car) trying to get behind 3 other black cars to make a chain of 4! Oh dear - not good eh?

Diet going well - not succumbed to any temptation yet. I won't bore you with the details.

Day 2 of a proper diet

2008-01-21T21:49:00.001Z

I feel thinner already. Don't laugh! Honestly, I do. My trousers felt more comfy and the zip nearly fastened to the top (that isn't just a fatness problem, I think the zip is a bit knackered).

And I'm sure I'm detoxing because I have a lovely outbreak of spots on my face. Well, if I'm really honest they started at the weekend, pre-diet.

So how is it going? Well, ok. I am very concerned about how "travelling" is going to go - because I have realised that with Slimming World you don't get much in the way of sandwiches. But tomorrow will be a tester - a good old "Buffet Lunch" to contend with. I'm taking emergency nuts/seeds and fruit, just in case there is nothing suitable. Well, I can probably tell you now that there won't be.

I'm doing an exam tomorrow afternoon - not a long or difficult one, but nevertheless I can't afford to be distracted by hunger pangs, can I?

This morning we went to a funeral. It was Renee's dad, who died from pancreatic cancer at age 83. She wrote a very touching tribute to him, which the lady minister read. It rained really heavily - and it was a proper burial. Not a good combination. We didn't go back to the house as I was working, and had just sneaked out for an hour or so to pay my respects.

Didn't experiment with any interesting foods today so not much to report diet wise. Except this: it has been a Zantac free day. In fact, barely no heartburn at all bar a little in the church (which I think was stress as I was a bit twitchy about being at a funeral) which a Rennie managed to shift.

Oh god, how many Syns are there in a Rennie........

Oops I suppose I should post my menu plan for today, a "green day".
Breakfast:
1oz porridge oats made with water, splash of milk, tsp of maple syrup
Small smoothie made with very low fat yogurt, grape juice, blueberries and raspberries

Lunch:
Huge bowl of lentil and veg soup
Fresh pineapple

Dinner:
Small tuna steak (marinated in evoo, wine vinegar, fennel seeds, chilli and garlic)
Roasted peppers, carrot, fennel
Mangetout
Noodles
Lemon juice to flavour
Roasted apricots with a dash of maple syrup, dessert spoon of very low fat vanilla fromage frais

Snack:
1 Laughing Cow Light triangle
Grapes

The Diet starts here!

2008-01-20T14:48:00.000Z

The chosen diet plan is Slimming World.
http://www.slimmingworld.com/

The basic premise is low fat, lots of fruit and veg, not too much sugar.. blah blah blah.

Like most "commercial" diets, it structures its plan in such a way that if you follow it correctly you'll eat really healthy food. However, as with most such plans, there is opportunity to:
a) trade "points" (in this case "syns") for treats
b) be encouraged to eat fake foods (artificial sweeteners, fake meat etc)

I also find it uses a lot of packaged foods as "quick and easy meal ideas/recipes". For example, those dried pasta meals that you poor water into and rehydrate. One recipe recommends making this up, blending it until smooth and then mixing in real pasta. It makes me full ill just at the suggestion.

So, am I sounding negative enough yet about my new diet? Maybe that's because I just ate lunch, which included Quorn Sausages. I have never in my life eaten Quorn, and lets just say that I don't think I'm going to be it's biggest fan.

Today's menu (we're on a Red Day):

Breakfast:
1oz porridge oats, made with water, splash of milk and a teaspoon of maple syrup.
(Note to self: buy smaller bowls so that paltry cereal portion looks more substantial).
1 banana
Coffee

Lunch:
2 rashers of lean bacon
2 Quorn sausages
Tinned tomatoes
Scrambled eggs (done in microwave so as to avoid using fat)
2 small pieces of wholemeal toast
Mushrooms
The mushrooms were poached in stock and then drained and "dry fried" to take the slimy texture off and colour them. I could hear them squealing in protest as they went into the dry frying pan. They were saying "nooooo don't - we're not supposed to be boiled and then heated up - we deserve to be sauteed in olive oil, or even butter. Or roasted with a drizzle of oil. Please don't torture us like this again". Honestly - they were. I heard them!

1 tangerine
Cup of tea

Dinner:
Smoked haddock (poached in milk)
Spinach
Poached egg

Fresh apricots with very low fat vanilla flavoured fromage frais/yogurt.

I did buy "Muller Light" yogurts, but I can't get past the ingredient label - my main worry being aspartame, a natural source of phenyalanine. One website tells me that this is a neurotoxin and will cause cancer and all sorts of horrors. Another tells me that it is an essential amino acid that my body can only get through food and that the reason the "warning" is on the label is because some people are born with rare genetic disorder which means that they are unable to properly metabolise phenylalanine. They have to limit intakes of all foods that contain this amino acid, including meat, fish, dairy, eggs and products containing artificial sweeteners.

I just opened the pot of vanilla flavoured yogurt/fromage frais to test it. It claims to contain nothing artificial but clearly has some kind of colouring in it as it's a lurid yellow colour. It tastes like sour grainy cold custard. Not TOO bad, but not great.

Choices, choices. I think that next week I'll buy plain fromage frais and put some vanilla essence and honey into it. Surely a teaspoon of honey is better than some cooked up artificial sweetener? Or maybe I could do without.

So folks, if you're thinking I won't last long on Slimming World, you could be right. But I'm committed to a one week trial. This week I'm not travelling so much (well no overnight stays anywhere) so it's a good week to give it a whirl.

Plus I've just spent ages chopping veg and making lentil and veg soup and tomato sauce for pasta.

Oh - and in case you're wondering: No, I haven't been weighed. Can't face it. Yeah, I know - how will I know I'm succeeding if I don't have measures? I'll know - trust me.

For one - the horrendous heartburn that has plagued me for the last few months will cease. And I can stop taking Zantac by the bucket load.
Two - my suit jackets will close and fasten without me breathing in hard.
Three - said suits will start to hang off me and I'll be able to dig out the other ones which no longer fit.

2008 - how can I make it a good one?

2008-01-18T23:51:00.000Z

This is an excerpt from what I wrote on 3rd January 2007:

*Sigh* It's that time of year when Roy has to do his tax return and I hate it. I can't describe to you how disorganised this man is. And then of course I get involved and irritated by the whole thing. *Takes deep breath and points husband in the direction of the filing cabinet*

Here is the Virgoan New Year Resolution Diet:
Jan 1st: resolve to Diet in the new year.
Jan 2nd: go through all the Christmas leftovers, deciding what you can make of them, as you won't throw good food away.
Jan 3rd: (and for several days thereafter)eat said leftovers.
Jan 4th: get out your huge collection of diet and fitness books and prevaricate for ages about which one to follow in the new year.
Jan 5th: procrastinate some more over The Diet, whilst polishing off leftover chocolate, cake and peanuts.
Jan 6th: enjoy a huge lunch (well it IS the weekend)
Jan 7th: have a Monday panic because The Diet hasn't yet begun. Pick up those books again.
Jan 8th: decide to look online for support and ideas. Spend the next three days surfing the net.
Jan 10th: finish off the peanuts (make note to self not to buy such a huge jar next Christmas) and spot a huge bottle of full fat Coca Cola in the fridge. Drink it.
Jan 11th: remember that you rejoined the gym and start to consult exercise books for ideas on the fastest way to lose that tummy.
Jan 12th: compile shopping list for The Diet.
Jan 13th: go to supermarket, buying healthy food sufficient to feed 12 people for a month.
Jan 14th: start to eat healthy food. Like it so much you have second portions of everything.
Jan 15th: sample three new types of Healthy Eating Cereal Bars and love all of them.
Jan 16th: have another panic attack as you realise you haven't reached your goal of four gym visits per week. Do one very long session to make up lost time.
Jan 17th: get weighed (well you had to let the Christmas bloat settle down). Feel sick as you realise you've regained (and some) since your last Diet. Comfort eat for the rest of the day.
Jan 18th: consider hypno-therapy and start to research it on the internet.
Jan 19th: discount hypno-therapy as too expensive.
Jan 20th: discover some uneaten goodies in the back of the fridge. Take them to the bin. Bring them back in the house. Take them out again. Bring them back in. Say "oh sod it" and eat them in one sitting.
Jan 21st: Realise you haven't been very good on The Diet. Oh well, it's the weekend.
Jan 22nd: Monday weigh in. You have gained 3lbs since starting The Diet.
Jan 23rd: time to get serious. Throw out all the out of date healthy food and prepare to restock.
Jan 24th: reacquaint yourself with the gym. Realise it is full of January Joiners and get irritated at how busy it is and how you can't get onto your favourite machine. Go home early.
Jan 25th: cook three months' supply of healthy stews and soups to freeze.
Jan 26th: realise that lentil soup doesn't freeze well and eat three portions.
Jan 27th: it's the weekend! Enjoy a special treat, since you've been on The Diet almost one month.
Jan 28th: order three new exercise DVDs from Amazon.
Jan 29th: buy Detox Diet book from the supermarket. Get home and realise you already have it.
Jan 30th: decide to tackle the psychological aspect of your overeating before attempting any physical Dieting. Dig out 14 self help books from the book cupboard.
Jan 31st: prepare to start the New Diet in February. Work out how much weight you can lose by Valentine's Day.

I'd actually forgotten about it until I was browsing my blog earlier. And I was shocked to see how little had changed in 2008. Well - one minor change - I did Roy's tax return this year because he refused to see his Accountant (she filed his return late last year and he got fined). I'm not sure if it was more or less irritating than last year. Probably about the same.

But when I read the Virgoan Diet - it struck me how I've followed pretty much the same pattern this year (and yet that piece above was written in jest last year!). Hmmmm. As the Stranglers said: Something Better Change.

So, I need to make some positive changes in 2008 else I'll be recycling that Virgoan Diet crap this time next year, and that's just lazy.

Watch this space.

A Story of Christmas Tradition……

2007-12-16T11:42:00.000Z

Or, How to Make a Bunloaf.

This is a tale of family tradition, lost recipes and happy times.

In my home town of Liverpool, for many families – including my own – it was traditional to have Bunloaf at christmas time. Bunloaf is, as you will see, like a fruitcake. In our family it was always made, and distributed, by my Nana. Every year, we would eagerly await the foil wrapped package and try to show some restraint when it finally arrived. Then, we’d have to savour every mouthful – we only got one, and it had to go round all 5 of us. Plus, it would be a whole year until we got another!

Ingredients:

6oz soft dark brown sugar
Half pint cold water
8oz butter
1lb raisins, sultanas – or any mixed fruit
1lb self raising flour
2tbs marmalade
2tsps mixed spice
4 eggs

The ingredients are simple. You also have to remember that this recipe originated in a time when recipe books didn’t really exist – I certainly never saw one in my Nana’s house. In fact, I’m not even sure she had weighing scales!
And yet, delicious home made food would appear all year round from her kitchen. It’s funny, because many of us today have shelves lined with glossy tomes from Nigella, Jamie etc, and yet so much of our food comes out of packets! My nana didn’t own a recipe book and yet cooked everything from scratch. And she was a working mum, with few labour saving devices.
Although I will admit, in her later years she did become rather fond of Cup a Soups!

Ok, so here’s how you make the loaf.

Put the sugar, water, butter and fruit into a saucepan and bring to the boil
Boil for 10 minutes
Leave to cool, cover
and leave overnight

I don’t actually remember my Nana making her bunloaf this way – from my recollection she used the traditional method of creaming the butter and sugar and gradually beating in the eggs. Much more labour intensive. Now, when my Nan became too old to stand making bunloaves all day, the duty passed on to my mum – Nan was living with her by then and so could supervise every move. As she got older, as a safety precaution, we asked her to write down the ingredients. And she did. Unfortunately Nan died in 1993.

The next Christmas, I said to Mum – "you’ll be making the bunloaves this year, then?" The answer was yes. But, there was a problem – the carefully guarded recipe had disappeared. To this day we don’t know what happened to it. So - no bunloaf. And the end of a tradition.

This was pre – internet times, so Googling was not an option. As time went on we gradually forgot about this old family tradition. But not about our Nan, of course!

Next day, put the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl
Add the marmalade to the fruit and mix well
Add the beaten eggs and stir until combined

Can you imagine my delight when more than 10 years later – in 2004 – a friend of mine mentioned that her mum had sent her a bunloaf through the post. Doh! Why had I not thought of asking a fellow scouser if they knew of anybody with the recipe. And so, within minutes, it appeared in my inbox.

Now you’d never guess it to look at me, but I like my food. And, when I have some free time, I like to potter about in the kitchen…. and so, with my mum no longer able herself to make them, I took up the challenge of reinstating a tradition, and supplying my family with bunloaf at Christmas.

So the method was different – but the result was the same. Beautiful fruit loaf that brought back my happy christmas time memories.

Put the fruit/egg mix into the dry ingredients and beat until
thoroughly combined
Line two loaf tins with
greaseproof paper and fill
with the mixture
Bake for between 1 and 2
hours on 140 degrees

I’m not sure of the origins of this tradition, or indeed, if it’s confined to Liverpool. I do know that in Liverpool we called priests Father Bunloaf – no idea why, and google hasn’t been much help there either!

Remove from oven and allow to cool
Remove loaves from tins and wrap in foil
Freezes well
Best served slightly warmed (10 seconds in the microwave) or with butter

And here you have it – the finished bunloaf. I make around 12 -14 each Christmas to feed my family and now my husband’s family are in on the act (despite being from Leeds).

So, in essence, this is a tasty fruit cake. But to me it represents far more than that. Every slice is packed full of memories, family tradition and love.

Happy Christmas.

So much to update here

2007-10-12T11:45:00.000+01:00

I keep promising to update my holiday blogs. Wales is pretty much done, but I'm having problems with the photos. Maldives I haven't even started. I have only my hand written notes... I could be lazy and scan them in, but you'd never read my writing.

I also should tell you all about my new job. Maybe I'll do some serious blogging at the weekend.

Gosh, I've just read back on something from April this year (I was trying to recall a conversation I'd had with Dad about something). I never thought I would look back on my blogs from those days but when I did I realised how much I've forgotten already (just little things, funny tales etc). I'm so glad I have them recorded. In with the painful stuff are some nice things I can reflect on in time.

Anyway, my point was going to be: I can't believe how graphic some of the blogs were! I apologise for anybody who read them and was upset/distressed/offended! Yeuwww.... did I really write those things? Did I really DO some of the things I did? How quick the mind moves on.

A little poem I meant to share ages ago....

2007-10-10T19:43:00.000+01:00

I'm wishing you an angel

That's right there by your side

To comfort and to care for you

And be there as your guide

Rejoicing in the your good times

And when you most need hope

May she help you lift the burden

And give you strength to cope

Let her be the voice of wisdom

Gently whispered in your ears

And the suit of armour worn

To face your greatest fears

I'm wishing you an angel

Sent to watch you from above

A friend who gently guards you

With a heart that's full of love

This was in a card that I bought one day, and in Dad's final days we placed it under his pillow. He never read it, or knew it was there.

Goodbye Fiha, and Happy Birthday Dad!

2007-09-28T13:15:00.004+01:00

28th September - my Dad's birthday.

Going home day. I didn't sleep well and was up at 6.30am. We had more or less packed the night before and didn't have much to do. Had coffee on balcony - weather not so great today. We chatted about how 2 weeks of sun and doing nothing is probably not our dream holiday any more, but had been exactly what we needed this time, after the events of this year.

We went for breakfast and then waited in reception as the boat wasn't due to leave until 9.30am. At 9.25am they (island staff) came running round calling our room number. Looks like we were keeping the first boat waiting! No matter.

Took an hour to get to Male - quite choppy. Boat 2 over took us. Check in was fast but I think our island was the last to arrive and so none of us managed to get seated together (i.e. with our partners).

Long, boring flight. Got a bit upset halfway home thinking about Dad - it being his birthday, I was thinking that he should have been here to celebrate it. He'd have been 69, by the way.

Landed early, at 6.30pm and Paul picked us up and took us to my sister's house for a Chinese meal. This was a send off for Joe, my nephew, who goes away to University in Lancaster tomorrow.

Nice evening. Had a great sleep. End of holiday.

Our last full day on Fiha

2007-09-27T12:09:00.004+01:00

Up early and in for breakfast just after 8. A record! Too hot for sunbathing so we prowled around the deck again, snorkelled and did a bit of packing.

Sausage in mash for lunch, yes, in this heat! Followed by choc sponge and custard.

After lunch we did our last snorkel and I was thrilled to see once again, the school of surgeon fish. I followed them down the reef for ages. And now you can follow them down the page.

Our final massage was at 5pm. How can these tiny girls be so powerful?

We then got ready for sunset, drinks and dinner. Dinner was American theme. Poor Mohammed and all the other waiters were dressed up in jeans, checked shirts and cowboy hats. How demeaning. Not to mention hot. The food was good - grilled lamb chops, bbq chicken, creamed spinach, pumpkin mash, burgers - just to name a few things we tried.

After dinner we had a drink with Becca and her mum in Fishermans Bar and listened to live music. It poured with rain on our way home, we got drenched!

It's very embarrassing - but we don't know Becca's mum's name and after knowing them for two weeks I don't like to ask!

Starting to think about home

2007-09-26T09:41:00.003+01:00

Hotter than yesterday. Woke at 7. After breakfast we bought some tat in the shop - pictures for our bathroom at home. Then we sunbathed. I'm now in the shade already. Tracy Chapman is on the ipod. Life is good.

A quick snorkel before lunch (apparently the turtle was out but we didn't see him).
Lunch was good - fishfingers and salad cream, sweet and sour chicken. Bread and butter pudding.

Back massage at 2.30pm. Really good -s he really finds those evil knots in between my shoulder blades. I had a bit of time to reflect whilst massage was being done. I started thinking about how Dad told me he'd never had a massage. I remember being surprised and wishing I'd bought him one for a birthday present as he said he'd have liked to try it. Then I started to ponder on life after holidays - back to a job, a normal life. Earning money! I wondered about coming across all of Dad's stuff that we kept - medicines, his Blood Sugar testing kit, etc). I wonder if they'll just become harsh reminders of bad times - should they be thrown away?

After my massage I walked to the sunset viewing platform at the end of the water villas and had a ponder about life and the future. I watched Geordie Boy snorkel across the lagoon in front of the Water Villas. Now there's a guy who lives life to the full.

After Roy got back we sat mostly in the shade and then went for a late afternoon snorkel. Loads of tiny tiny fish in the water. Some more new fish. The house reef here really is very impressive. We came back and showered, watched another near perfect sunset and walked down to Blue Lagoon where it took us 40 minutes to get 2 beers. So we had a moan about that and then headed to dinner. It was Maldivian buffet night and was really tasty. I had no idea what I was eating but it tasted great. Lots of rice puddings, too.

After dinner we watched Wiggy on the jetty for ages and also two Rays. Met Rebecca and her mum (our neighbours from room 63) and went for a drink with them in the Fisherman's bar. Didn't get to bed until after midnight, which is late for us!

Let the pampering commence.

2007-09-25T09:28:00.004+01:00

Another RED HOT day. "Sunbathed" after breakfast, which involved the pair of us prowling in and out of the shade all morning. Snorkelled for an hour and then dried off for lunch. After lunch, more relaxing on deck before our massage at 3pm. We had a wonderful back and indian head massage at the Spa. We've booked some more.

This afternoon's snorkel was nice, nothing majorly exciting but I am still amazed that we see new fish every time we go out. Roy finally saw the clown triggerfish today.

Tonight we had the first perfect sunset all holiday - where we saw the sun disappear behind the horizon. Beautiful.

Drinks at Blue Lagoon and then dinner. Theme was Oriental Buffet but it was a bit rubbish. Not much choice. Beef in sauce, noodles, rice, egg custard tart, fruit and nut sponge and custard.

After a jetty walk we came back to Blue Lagoon - it was packed full of people! Not used to that.

Full moon lit the beach up beautifully but the atmosphere was somewhat ruined by there being no lazy chairs available and a loud English girl behind us bleating on and on and on....

Had a beer and came back to the villa to shine our torch into the lagoon and sleep. It's good to stargaze here - seeing the Plough upside down is quite amusing!

A new home

2007-09-24T09:04:00.004+01:00

Wow, today is sunny AND hot!

We picked up the keys to our water villa after breakfast and moved straight in.

It's gorgeous - very private and with fabulous decking area outside.

As I write, I am back from lunch (egg salad sandwich and chocolate gateau) and just sitting in the shade on our deck watching the island maintenance men building a new groyne on the beach near to the Blue Lagoon Bar. It is a shame they have to put these in but they help slow down beach erosion and so are necessary. They look ugly though. This picture shows the beach BEFORE the groyne goes in.

My morning snorkel unearthed the black eel asleep in his rock, and the Clown Triggerfish. He's tricky to photograph - the best I could do is on this page but take from above so you can't really see his beautiful markings very well. Not much else. Will go out later. The second picture is a big Titan triggerfish with poppy eyes. These things bite if you go anywhere near their nests.

It is so hot on our deck. We last a short while in the sun before retreating back into the shade. Spent all afternoon chilling on deck and watching the rollers coming in over the far reef. Tonight, Roy went to pick up a bottle of wine from the bar which we drank on deck and watched the best sunset all holiday. A perfect first day in our villa.

Dinner was a "no particular theme" night but good. BBQ beef and sausages. After dinner we watched a Dive Team slideshow in Fishermans and then came back to our villa for coffee and star gazing/lagoon torching on deck. Bedtime.

And now we find the downsideds to an ocean villa. We left doors and curtains open in hope of getting some breeze into the room. After a while, the heat was still stifling and the noise of the ocean on our deck was becoming unbearable. At about 4am we tried closing all the doors and windows up and letting the fan and air con cool the room. Problem is, it's a wooden room with 2 tiny air con units. The wood absorbs all the heat and won't let go of it - kind of like a sauna!

Eventually we slept. Woke just before 8 with the light coming in to the room - something else we weren't used to in our bungalow, which had black out curtains.

Hot, humid and overcast.

2007-09-23T08:43:00.002+01:00

Sort of overcast today - but very hot.

The sun is strong through the cloud cover.

Breakfast early (for us) at 8.45am. Then we went to look at the notice boards near reception. I like to check daily to see if anything new has been pinned up. Invariably it hasn't.

We came across Geordie Boy (we now know that his real name is Mr Foo) looking at the excursions. We note with interest that he has booked on another night fishing trip - this time the long one which lasts till 11pm.

Hot Hot Hot.

Snorkelled and found the black moray eel swimming along on the reef. Then back to sunbed.

After lunch (yummy ginger/nut egg custard) we walked a bit, despite me being afflicted with a severe case of snorkel-foot. (Pain in my foot, I think caused by my fins). Then we had another snorkel. Saw a fantastic sight - a school of powder blue surgeon fish were eating on the coral - there must have been 200 of them. Cue typically idiotic Russians diving into their midst.

Back home. Lovely red skies tonight so here's hoping for a clear day tomorrow.

Dinner - Fiesta Mexicana - was very good. Fajitas with chicken in pepper and coriander sauce. And Coconut Flan.

Eel excitement

2007-09-22T22:52:00.003+01:00

The sun came out today! At 9.30am. Yay.

We spent 40 minutes on the jetties doing "Dolphin Watch" as a guy had told us they swam past every morning between 9.30 and 10.30am. We gave up just after 10 - we're impatient like that.

Plus we never see sodding dolphins!

Sat on the beach this morning before heading out for a snorkel. I couldn't see the eel in his usual home so we decided to go turtle hunting further down the reef. As we got to the "fallen tree corner" of the beach, I heard Geordie Boy telling some other Brits that he hadn't seen the turtle today. They said there was a Moray Eel out though, so I headed back off toward the reef in the general direction in which they were pointing.

Sure enough, a few minutes later, our eel swam past me. I looked for Roy but he'd got out of the water by now. I swam on, still determined to find the turtle. I was on a part of the reef I don't much like as it gets really choppy and sand swirls up making visibility not so great. I decided the best thing to do was to snorkel on to the next bay as I was too far out from the beach and going against the current if I swam back to our sun beds. I glanced down and was amazed to see a huge Honeycomb Moray right below me in a rock. Wow!

I took some photos and then looked up to see Roy on the shore about 20 metres away. I swam over to him and told him to come out and see the eel. Incredibly, I managed to find the exact spot straight away and the eel was still there. He didn't like it though, when I put my flash on the camera - he snapped his head up at me, mouth wide open! Oops. I swam off, a bit freaked out by this!

So, a highly successful snorkel.

After lunch we sat in the shade and read and then had a short snorkel. Then more reading. Followed by a game of travel scrabble on the patio and a quick session of stalking Wiggy along the beach.

Before we knew it, it was dinner time. BBQ Buffet theme tonight, which was a bit odd. But ok.

After dinner we chatted with our next door neighbours who had been on the sunset fishing trip. As had Geordie Boy - again. Then we headed to Blue Lagoon where we pondered on a huge black cloud shaped like the UK. We watched it roll in from the sea and pointed out Kings Lynn, Bristol and Liverpool. It didn't bring rain. Bed by 11.

Rain stops play...

2007-09-21T22:34:00.001+01:00

We had a pleasant time on the jetty after breakfast watching a needlefish stalking a bunch of small fish (unsuccessfully). Then a small Ray came in to help, got his breakfast and retreated back under the jetty.

It is raining today. During a short break in rain we ventured out snorkelling. The eel is still there, wrapped around a coral outcrop, and this time we got a good look at the back of his body. Unfortuntely, a bad storm blew in while we were snorkelling so we got out of the water fast!

We're now in our room listening to music and the rain.

It cleared up a bit at teatime, so we took a long walk around the island. It took us one and a quarter hours to circumnavigate it - surely this is a record? This did include a beer stop at Blue Lagoon (well we were exhausted after walking up and down the water villa path way) and a long search in the trees for fruitbats. Once again, we found none. Just a big gecko. Sitting on our balcony later, we listened to the noise of the sea, the wind rustling leaves and every now and then, the soft "pat" of flowers falling to the sand off the trees. It's a great sound - so relaxing. And the beautiful yellow flowers decorate the pathways (until they die in the heat). I don't know the name of this flower. When it is dry, the flowers are orange, when it rains, they are yellow.

Back to room for a read and then out to dinner at 8. It was "Food from the Region" which turned out to be a cross between "Curry Night" and "Chinese Night" - i.e. very good. With a beautiful rice, nut and fruit pudding on the dessert tray.

Lots of new arrivals today - the Manchester flight has come in which means that we have been here for one week already.

After dinner, we were deciding whether or not to take a jetty walk. "I'm not going on there is Geordie Boy is on it" I said. There was no sign of him so we sauntered down, wondering where he was. We'd seen him and Mrs Geordie Boy charging out of dinner at about 8.30pm. We were also wondering what the fairly large crowd of people lining the edges of the jetty were looking at. "hmm, must be some Rays about " we said.

Something MUCH bigger than a Ray was in the water - yes, it was Geordie Boy! He was out snorkelling with a male companion and with the same torch as us! (It's an underwater torch). Roy was horrified. I was massively impressed and had to struggle to suppress a fit of laughter.

Geordie Boy - not content with monopolising the jetty at night - had picked the busiest jetty walking time to take a night snorkel. Brilliant! Genius, in fact.

He and his pal were taking lots of photographs of sharks and fish.

After that we took a seat outside Fisherman's Bar and listened to the Crab Racing going on inside. They (largely Germans) were bidding for Crabs. The "owner" of the winning Crab got beer as a prize.

"My name is Fritz, and I name my crab: Speedy".

Enough of that! Off to Blue Lagoon for liquer coffee and lightning.

Sheet lightning finally drove us to bed at 11pm.

Ramblings about Fihalohi island and its inhabitants

2007-09-20T19:07:00.002+01:00

Island Residents:
80%+ of holiday makers here are not British.
A Russian plane deposited about 50 new occupants a few days ago. Many of them are very tall and some of the women tower over the men and have very broad backs. Generally.

Next are the Germans. They politely say "good morning" if you can manage to make eye contact with them, otherwise they do not bother with anybody else at all.

There is a smattering of Italian and French residents. Then a handful of Brits - in only about 20 of the rooms. They don't mingle much either.

The Italians like to stand around in gangs, talking. They have a leader. A short bald guy who is always holding court in the centre of a group.

I think that some of the more sociable Brits are trying to emulate this. Geordie Boy has a Jetty Gathering of Brits going on every night after dinner. It seems to consist of him showing the entire contents of his digital camera to everybody who cares to look. I guess I am only jealous, cos last time I looked he had pictures of a turtle, fruit bat and exotic bird. He's always skulking around in the jungle and staff accommodation areas looking for wild life.

According to our waiter, Mohammed, the French and Italians are the biggest complainers - and he reckons that their English improves immeasurably when they need to complain. I observed Mohammed's response to a French woman's complaint about a chip in her coffee cup today. He told her "it is a 3 star resort, not 5 star". I found it all very amusing... chips in cups are, I guess, inexcusable in any establishment! Then he bitched about her to me when clearing up. "She's always moaning and it is her second visit here so she knows what to expect. All of the waiters were trying to avoid looking after her when she got here this time."

The Dining Room:
The dining room is our key source of entertainment here. All human life is there. It is fascinating and we've got the best seats in the house. Right on the edge of the room, near the main entrance and exit door. We see it all.
First off is the disproportionate amount of time that people spend reading the "notice board" at the entrance way. It holds two A4 sized cards displaying the events and food theme for today and tomorrow. It takes a maximum of 10 seconds to read and yet people stand there for several minutes gaping at it. Even taking into account "translation" time for non English speakers, it seems excessive.
Next, the feeding habits of people. Some rush in, bang on opening at 8pm and do not go to their table, do not pass go, do not collect £200 - but they head directly for the buffet as if all the food were going to be gone by 8.02pm. It isn't, they replenish it right up to end of service at 9.30pm.
They pile their plates (often more than one plate) and then soon after we see them going back for dessert. These people are usually exiting the dining room by 8.30pm.
I don't think there is a typical nation that displays this feeding frenzy habit - I was going to say it's mainly the Russians, but they are usually still eating at 9, having gone back for seconds and thirds.

Then there is the game playing at the buffet. Some people do not like to queue (although there rarely is one anyway) so they send one of their party up to "hold the serving spoon" thus stopping anybody else from getting into the buffet tray, whilst the rest of the group all saunter up in their own good time and pass the spoon. The spoon holder manages to maintain ownership of the spoon by adopting a vacant, disinterested look and dropping eye contact with anybody else who approaches them. Clever. Chief offenders here are French and German islanders.

Once we've dissected the group habits at the buffet, Roy and I then home in on individual tables. First we like to discuss who has gone home or is absent for other reasons (a trip?, an argument?, sickness?). Next, we give a quick update on the progression of peoples' tans. Then we debate our particular favourites or their idiosyncrasies.

Roy, for example, is fixated on "Fastidious Man". A person in his 50's who eats so tidily and neatly. Even his plate is arranged neatly, which takes some doing on a buffet. He is often found dining solo, sans wife (I'll come back to her later). We later discovered that she goes diving some days which explains her absence.

My personal favourite is Giant Jimmy Nail. A morose Russian guy in his 20's. I like to observe his rudeness to Mohammed, the waiter, and tut at him. Giant Jimmy Nail is about 7 foot tall. His girlfriend is stunning (she's only 6 foot tall) and he's with her on one of the most beautiful places on earth. And yet he rarely, if ever, cracks a smile. Why so unhappy, Giant Jimmy Nail?

Then of course there is the strange carry on at the table right next to us. It is currently occupied by two French people - although not necessarily at the same time. Occupant 1 is a young pale guy with glasses. We only see him at evening time, usually early, and he's a quick eater who is gone by 8.30pm. He never buys a cold drink. He drinks only the free tea or coffee provided - usually has about 3 cups of it on the table. Occupant 2 is, we think, his grandmother. She is in her 70's - fit and sprightly looking - and also never buys a drink. She seems to appear only after he has left the dining room. One evening, to our amazement, she dashed in at 9.27pm (they're very keen here on clearing up as soon as the clock hits 9.30pm) and proceeded to fill three bowls with food. One for salad, one for hot food and one with dessert. Then she went back for 2 coffees. Goodness knows what time she got out of there, but the waiting staff did not look happy! Last night they surprised us by eating together. Still didn't buy a drink though! I guess they must drink tap water in their room.

I wonder who's got us under surveillance?

Wiggy and other predators.
We have spent many an entertaining afternoon watching Wiggy (our resident heron) hunt fish. He stalks constantly across the shore line, or he sits on top of the buildings (mainly the water villas) watching the shore. He likes to let other fish (baby black reef tip sharks in particular) scare the tiddlers into jumping out of the water - and then he goes in for the kill. After he's got his fish, he leaves it flapping, clamped in his beak, for a little while and then he eats it. Always takes a small drink of sea water afterwards.
Today he had three baby sharks doing the work for him... it was quite a sight. At one stage he went into the trees and brought out a twig, which he placed into the water. Then he sat atop a water villa for a short while and returned to the twig later on. I can only assume it was his market.
He also likes to chase crows through the trees, which is a noisy business.

Happy Birthday to me!

2007-09-20T17:09:00.003+01:00

Last night we sat and watched a storm coming in from sea. It was quite sinister to see, as big black clouds covered the moon and stars and then our island. At 1.30am we were woken by THE largest thunder claps I've ever heard in my life. I thought our bungalow roof would come off. The rain continued for a while and then eased off. I could see it bouncing off the floor outside, presumably washing away the think layer of sand that covers the concrete in front of the bungalows. Rain woke us intermittently through the night and by 9am it had stopped but it is very overcast.

We had coffee on our balcony as I opened my birthday cards. I had a little cry when I opened my card from Mum. It should have been from Mum and Dad and that's all I am going to say on the subject.

After breakfast we strolled around the shop (again). Roy says I am only allowed a total of 10 visits into the shop and I think I've had 6 already. Then we looked on the jetty and finally back to our room.

After lunch - pasta, pizza, rice, chicken, black forest gateau - we went for a snorkel. How exciting - Roy spotted an eel resting in the coral! And I found two gorgeous clams, one with ultra-violet inside it.

We went fruit bat hunting in the jungle (interior of the island) this afternoon but didn't spot any.

We got ready early tonight as we'd booked to go on the sunset fishing trip at 5.30pm. There were just ten of us on the boat. It was fairly dull. Livened only by Geordie Boy's (more on him later) competitive fishing. He even brought along his own fishing reel. At one point one of the Maldivian boat boys took my line and wouldn't give it back to me for a good 20 minutes! Anyway, I caught two fish, Roy caught none. Ooooh he didn't like that!

Dinner was fish and chips (ironically). I was surprised by Mohammed (our waiter) having decorated our table and then he brought out a lovely birthday cake. They check for birthdays etc when you register. Nice touch. A few drinks in the bar and then bed. Roy refused to do a jetty walk - I think he was sulking due to

a) not catching any fish and

b) forgetting his flashlight

It rained again from 11pm to 9am.

It's just another day for you and me in paradise

2007-09-19T23:23:00.005+01:00

You don't spring out of bed here. We usually just about manage to make breakfast by 9.15-ish. It finishes at 9.30.

Then we go back to read and cool down in our room. Then we hit the beach, usually under the shade of a tree and take a pre lunch snorkel. Today we saw this box puffer fish.

I forgot to mention lizards in my list of wildlife. And I've included a picture of the "bee tree" in today's blog.

Then lunch. Today - salad, tuna and pineapple (!) pizza, yoghurt and coconut curry. After lunch, a little lie down and read (well it IS the hottest part of the day).

Then more beach, definitely under a tree in the afternoon, and one or two more snorkels. Depending on the weather (cloud cover or not).

Pre Dinner drinks will either be sundowners at Blue Lagoon before showering, or drinks at Fisherman's Bar after showering. Either way, we're in dinner by about 8.15pm and back out at 9.30pm for more drinks, usually at Blue Lagoon. If we're lucky we can stargaze whilst sitting on the beach in low recliner chairs, which are sooooo comfortable.

We're always in bed between 11 and 12.

And that is pretty much the daily pattern here.

Bill Bryson is very funny

2007-09-18T23:02:00.003+01:00

Tuesday September 18th. Or at least I think it is. We have no idea what day it is.

We're laid like idiots on our sunbeds, on the beach, laughing hysterically out load at our Bill Bryson books. I am reading Thunderbolt Kid and Roy is reading Down Under. They are Dad's books - I took them from his room and decided they'd make good holiday reading. They do.

I can't remember the last time I laughed like this when reading.

It's overcast today. Lovely snorkelling though.

There are over 600 palm trees on the island. Ok, I know it's not THAT fascinating but it breaks up the bits where I say "went snorkelling" and "grilled fish for lunch". Back to the palm trees. They form a "ring" between the bungalows and the beach. Every morning a guy comes round and rakes up all the fallen debris from the palm trees and other trees. By night time, the ground is littered again. We haven't counted the trees - they are numbered.

Lunch: tuna and garlic butter sauce, butter couscous, salad, papaya. Roy: same, plus chocolate brownie and custard.

I never dreamed that I would become a beach walker. You know those couples who walk up and down the beach together all day. But sometimes it is the only way to cool down or to dry off.

Our afternoon snorkel was good despite the could cover. The visibility is excellent today. Seeing new fish every time we go out. Skipped sundowners (shock, horror) in favour of pre-dinner drinks at the Fishermans Bar. Well you've got to ring the changes, hey?

Dinner was a chinese buffet and was really good. Spring roll, special fried rice, noodles, beef in garlic and oyster sauce, sweet and sour fish. Then rice Congay which was yummy. Coffees in the Blue Lagoon whilst watching a storm out at sea. The lightening was weird.

Bed and Bill Bryson at 11.30. More LOL moments.

Sticky toffee pudding and custard... in this heat??

2007-09-17T22:44:00.002+01:00

Woke at 8 and then dozed a while.

We had porridge for breakfast. Nice, but strange in the heat. After a cool down in the room we snorkelled the house reef near our bungalow. Saw shark, parrot fish, lovely yellow fish.

For lunch it was... wait for it.... grilled fish! In mango sauce and with butter couscous and salad. Followed by papaya. Well I had papaya. Roy had sticky toffee pudding and custard. I am amazed at the selection of puds at lunchtime. I do think the food is better at lunch than dinner some days.

Our post lunch snorkel was good - saw lots of new fish.

You would not think that an island so small (700m round) would have so much wildlife on it. We've seen rats - one ran through the restaurant during dinner last night - and Roy saw one by our trees this morning. There is a bird that makes the most annoying loud sound - usually just when you're dozing off. Two herons. Black bees, which we watch from our balcony getting pollen from the tree outside our room. Little mini roadrunner type birds. Or Silly Birds as Roy calls them. Ants - lots of them, and some big buggers, too. What else? I forget for now.

The noisy bird sounds like a howler monkey. I've never actually heard a howler monkey but it's how I would imagine one to sound.

Went for a late snorkel at 5-ish and was thrilled to see my first ever Clown Triggerfish. Amazing markings. It disappeared fairly quickly though.

Sundowners at Blue Lagoon. It is VERY windy tonight... what is going to blow in? Dinner was fish, lemon rice, butter lemon sauce - big yum, as my friend Carol would say.

Diplomat pudding and coffee mousse cake.

Watched a diving film in the Fishermans bar after dinner and then headed to Blue Lagoon for a nightcap. It is now blowing a gale and rained heavily just after we got back in to our room tonight.

Sunday September 16th

2007-09-16T22:13:00.001+01:00

Woke at a respectable time, having both had an awful night's sleep. We went to breakfast - good selection - and then to the beach and to snorkel. I finally braved it to the house reef. Gorgeous!

Burnt my back yesterday and so will be in the shade or covered up today.

Had forgotten just how stunning the Maldives are. Fiha is interesting cos there is an island a few miles away (Rannali?) which can be seen quite clearly. This creates a view with fabulous layers of colour from our beach. White sand, pale blue lagoon, deep blue sea, and then a turquoise underlining the white and green and Rannali's beach and trees.

Gosh it is hot today - even with the breeze. Lunch choices here seem better than dinner. They always have a great selection of curry out - two veggie (usually pumpkin and dahl) and one fish. Today I had grilled fish, curry and rice. Roy had his dream dessert of blueberry crumble.

Spent an hour in our room after lunch cooling down. God it's hot today. Then ventured out for another snorkel and to dry off in the shade. Went for a walk around the island and to buy a torch from the shop. This for fish viewing off the jetty at night.

Dinner was italian theme... Roy got steak and rice, for me I had canneloni, beef, mashed potato and aubergine gratin! Then we had tiramisu, coconut pannacotta and italian meringue. All good.

After dinner there was a disco in the Fisherman's bar and so after our jetty walk we sat outside and listened to 80's pop. We are most definitely outnumbered by Germans here. In bed by 11.

Saturday September 15th

2007-09-15T22:13:00.000+01:00

We were woken at 11.35am by the room boy knocking at the door. Roy thought his watch had stopped because we'd slept so long! We'd missed breakfast.

Had a snorkel, I wasn't yet bold enough to go out to the reef drop off, and then went for lunch. They had a wonderful curried pumpkin and lentil dish. And papaya. After lunch, we walked round to the north shore and snorkelled a short section of the house reef. It was so much calmer here and I felt more confident. The reef here is only about 10 metres off the beach so a good place to start. Beautiful reef and lots of fish.

Later we had more sundowners at Blue Lagoon and watched one of the island's resident Herons - we have named him Wiggy - parading up and down the shoreline. We've decided that he's Dad's spirit reincarnated!

Finally unpacked our bags before dinner. Dinner was fish, veg and rice, followed by tarte tatin. Lost my little torch off the jetty. We then ended up at the lovely Blue Lagoon bar for stargazing and liquer coffees.

Bed at midnight. It was karaoke night in the main bar but after listening to two Germans murdering Herman's Hermit songs we decided not to bother.

Holiday time (again).... the Maldives

2007-09-13T19:58:00.001+01:00

Flew out on FCA142 from Manchester at five to seven in the evening. Bang on time. Really good flight - First Choice Airways is much better than I imagined with great leg room and comfy seats. Mind you, we did succumb to the offer of extra legroom seats for £35 each on checking in.

There were no window and aisle seats left - all pre-booked, apparently. I think you pay about £20 for the privilege of pre-booking. So we took the middle section bulkhead seats and were lucky to have three seats between the two of us. No neighbours. In fact, my only whinge about the flight (well you knew there had to be one!) was the girl behind me who moved her feet up and down the back of my seat all night.

Arrived in Male just before 9.30am. The weather was beautiful. Having been freezing on the plane, it was lovely to step out into the heat. Male was as small and efficient as I remembered from last time we were here (March 2004). By the time we cleared immigration the cases were coming through and ours were pretty quick out.

Roy had met Mick Durkin on the plane and at the airport (an old friend from Leeds) - he was going to Sun Island to celebrate his wife's 50th birthday.

After we got through bag screening, we found our island - there are little kiosks where you have to go to meet your Rep - and found a seat to wait to be called for our speedboat. What was weird was that Sky News was playing on giant screen. They definitely didn't have that last time!

I had been dreading the boat trip. I am not good on water. The weather was sunny and clear but the sea still looked a tad "rough" to me. At least I wasn't crying and refusing to board the boat like the lady in front of us! We didn't make the first boat leaving for Fihalhohi as it was full up (it was a small catamaran). The next boat docked as soon as the first left and off we went.

Coming past Male the sea did seem quite choppy but as soon as we got out onto open water it smoothed a bit. The journey was pretty good - watching small islands and atolls on the way. We spotted "Fiha" from quite a way out - you can't miss the telephone mast - and as we docked we were so happy to see that beautiful clear lagoon and friendly Maldivian faces.

In reception we were given cool towels and coconut juice, and our room key. We were in room 63, a single story bungalow on the south of the island, near a lovely stretch of beach. The lagoon here is choppier than on the north side, but the plus side is that this means we have a cooling breeze all day. The room is fine - spacious, clean and nice taps outside to wash the sand off your feet before coming in.

We dumped our bags and went straight to lunch. The food is buffet style and actually it is pretty good. The grill chef was cooking fresh tuna and so we ate that with garlic butter sauce (fabulous) and salad. Followed by watermelon. And lovely cold beer.

After lunch we enquired about a water villa upgrade for part of our stay. As luck would have it, one was available for the last 4 nights so we booked it. Then we hit the beach and had a little snorkel. I ended up back in the room sleeping for 2 hours! At sundown we headed for the Blue Lagoon bar for beers and photos.

It started to rain a bit at 8pm. We headed in to dinner at 8.30pm after another drink in the Fisherman's Bar (and that constitutes a pub crawl on Fiha). Dinner was a selection of fish, meat, veggie dishes. I had beef stew and rice with aubergine tomato bake. The wine selection is ok - cheap and cheerful really.

After coffees we had a look off the jetty where we say rays and baby reef sharks. set off back to Blue Lagoon bar for more drinks. I was falling asleep at the table so we went home and were in bed by 11. Slept like logs - in fact, too well.

Woo Hoo - I've signed off!

2007-09-11T16:07:00.000+01:00

Hurray! Today I took my signing on card down to the Job Centre and told them where to shove it. Well, that last bit isn't true... I politely and nicely explained that I wouldn't be signing on again and was no longer in need of their £59 per week.

I am out of the country from 13th September (did I mention I was going on hols??) and you are not entitled to Jobseekers Allowance when out of the country. Then, pretty much as soon as I get back, I'll be starting work.

So no more "dole" for me. No more signing on visits on Monday mornings. And I hope never again... or at least for a very long time.

So I celebrated with an iced coffee and a Breakaway biscuit.

Time for an update

2007-09-10T09:32:00.000+01:00

I haven't been blogging lately - mainly because there has seemed to be nothing major to blog about. Life has had no real pattern or drama - it has been a period of just trying to get "sorted out" in many ways. So here is what has been happening:

Dad:

We had said we would inter Dad's ashes very quickly after his cremation. We were even talking about doing it while the flowers were still fresh. We didn't get round to it. I'm not sure why... I think once a week had passed after the funeral, things started to just lumber on. I went home, then I went away for a week. Lorraine started working more days. We all got caught up in organising Mum and sorting out her house purchase. Before we knew it, nearly two months had gone by. Or, as Dad would have put it: "Another classic example of not getting things done straight away".

So, Lorraine had started to get bothered about Dad's ashes sitting around in someone's office waiting to be collected (and I don't blame her). We decided this should be done before Mum's house move and so we arranged the interment for Tuesday 28th August, the day after Bank Holiday.

It was a small, quiet affair - no minister involved, just Mum and the three children. Neil put the casket into the grave (Dad is buried with Mum's parents and grandmother at Yewtree Cemetery in Liverpool) and we all just stood there, sobbing. Mum finally said "He's where he wanted to be" and we came back home.

Next we will need to organise engraving the headstone.

Mum's house move:

Mum moved into her lovely new flat on 1st September. The week leading up to the move was hectic with lots of sorting and packing to be done. Lorraine and I did it. On the day of the move, we sent Mum to Lorraine's house, as she was getting very wound up and stressed. We then set about unpacking things into her new flat and didn't collect Mum until after 2pm when most of the kitchen and lounge was looking lovely.

Everything was pretty much finished by Sunday lunchtime.

Oh - we had a bit of drama on Sunday morning when Roy got locked into the bin store! He had to force his way out of the fire exit, which turned out to be alarmed and linked to the local police station! The police arrived about 15 minutes later, and luckily we were able to explain what had happened.... they didn't make a big deal of it!

Work:

I found a job. It is working for a company called Just Retirement and it is, at this moment in time, a dream job for me.

http://www.justretirement.com/default.html

I'll be a full time presenter/trainer basically going around the North of the country doing seminars to Financial Advisers. A part of my job that I've always enjoyed, and so, I'm looking forward to this. I start in October. I was concerned that taking a downshift might not be the right thing to do, but there are so many reasons why it is, that I'm prepared to take a chance on this. Just Retirement is a growing company and so who knows where this could lead.

Holidays:

We've booked a fortnight in the Maldives, starting 14th September.

http://www.fihalhohi.net/english/

I'll be taking lots of books, lots of Factor 30 sun cream, and my snorkelling gear.

Bad News:

Last week was a bad news week in many ways. Jane Tomlinson died, and I've followed her story over the years.

http://www.janesappeal.com/

Then Pavarotti died. Not that I knew him, but he had Pancreatic Cancer and so his was another story I'd had an interest in.

Then two more pieces of bad news which were much more personal to me.

First of all, I found out that my friend Barbara (who lives in Canada, but I got to know while she was in Widnes caring for her mum this year) had another cancer journey to embark on. Her husband Bill has been diagnosed with Bone Cancer in his arm. They await a Surgeon's appointment to agree treatment and prognosis. I wish Barbara all the strength she will need to cope with this... she's being tested to her limits this year.

Secondly, our good friend Yasser from Jinnah restaurant in Leeds passed away suddenly last week. Roy had spoken to him on Tuesday when he'd rung to make a booking for Saturday night. They'd had the usual banter about "where have you been, we haven't seen you for ages" and sport and stuff. Yasser used to tell us off if we'd stayed away from Jinnah for too long! I think the last time we'd been in was mid-July with Lorraine, Paul and Emily.

Apparently on the night he died, Yasser had been chatting with Chip Shop Dave* (a frequent visitor to Jinnah, he's in there all the time) and his wife. Then his head dropped to one side and after about a minute he slid off the chair and onto the floor - he was pronounced dead on arrival at hospital. They are doing a post mortem today.

Yasser was a vibrant, good looking, genuinely good man. He was 26. Here's a picture of him, with my niece, Emily, taken in June when we went there to celebrate her Birthday.

*Chip Shop Dave owns the Skyliner Fish shop and restaurant near to us. Isn't Chip Shop Dave a great name!!!???

The Late Night Horror Show

2007-08-18T12:51:00.000+01:00

It has been a funny week. Funny peculiar - not funny ha-ha. I've been more upset this week than any other since Dad died (7 weeks ago now). I don't know why that should be. My mum and sister seem to have been the same, so maybe we're all just starting to feel the reality of what has happened kicking in.

It takes me ages to get to sleep at night. As soon as I get into bed my mind starts playing a movie. It's the Late Night Horror Show. It starts with Dad in hospital - and knowing deep down that something was badly wrong, but waiting for the sickening reality to be confirmed. Then it fast forwards to the last weeks at home. The awfulness of watching somebody die. Vivid, unpleasant images of a ravaged body sustained only by a strong will and a family's love.
In the early days after Dad's death my mind played over and over again a Romantic Film... the grief and the sadness was softened by love and the peacefulness of the ending. And by the relief of seeing suffering end. I preferred the Romance to the Horror, although I knew inside it wasn't real.

I think I just have to ride this out. I am still in control. Just about.

Coping strategies:
- A self ban on visiting Macmillan and Cancer websites. The stories I see are just too heartbreaking.
- Getting back to a normal life and routine - i.e. finding a job.
- Finding another focus in my personal life - getting fit again is a good one.
- Oh and taking a holiday! Not to run away from things, but to relax mind and body before Autumn kicks in and a new life chapter unfurls.

Wonderful Waterfall Walk

2007-08-05T21:08:00.000+01:00

Waterfalls Walk - Ingleton.
http://www.ingletonwaterfallswalk.co.uk/index.htm

Today I started training for a walk I plan to do up Mount Snowden in Wales (highest mountain in England and Wales) next year. In fact, I may attempt three peaks in England, Scotland and Wales. Still putting my plans together - it'll be a fund-raising effort for Pancreatic Cancer research.

We headed over to Ingleton in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales to do the Waterfalls Walk. It is the first time we've done this walk in about 10 years. It's a beautiful walk and the day was perfect - warm and sunny and clear. We figured that if it got very hot in the afternoon, we'd be nice and cool on the shady footpath round the rivers.

So, we paid our £4 each for the privilege of walking the trail (including parking) and started walking at 11.20am. The trail is rocky and uneven, apart from when it hits really the steep sections and there they've put in massive steps. By that I mean steps that sap your energy as you climb up them - they're pretty high. After a while, each set of stairs got tougher and tougher. My heart was pounding hard and felt at times as if it were about to leap out of my chest. God I'm unfit. This was a real wake up call!

We stopped several times to admire the view. Well really, it was so that I could get my breath back. Half way round we stopped for a sandwich. Then onwards for the final push home. We'd fooled ourselves that the second section of the walk was going to be all down hill - in fact it wasn't. It was both up and down hill in equal measure - absolute murder on the knees!!

The picture below is looking toward Ingleborough hill - one of the three highest peaks in the Yorkshire Dales. The other two are Whernside and Pen-y-Ghent. We've climbed the first two - but not Pen-y-Ghent. They are on the list for the training plan!

Well, the point of today's blog was to insert my photographs, but Blogger is failing me... so I'll have to put them in tomorrow. Ah - they seem to be uploading now. However, these photographs alone can't convey the power and energy of the water... the noise was incredible at some of the falls. I hope you can see the tea coloured water falling over the rocks... it looks really unusual. But first, another view from the long open section of the trail - this section cuts across a couple of farms and takes you from the first river - the River Twiss - to the second one, River Doe.

There's also a picture here of a fallen tree with coins embedded into bark... there are several of these around the walk. I remember taking my nephew Joe, about 12 years ago when he was only 6 years old. Of course, he was the only child trying to take the coins OUT rather than put them in, LOL!

Some of the falls on the second half of the walk (you move on from one river to another one) are more beautiful than on the first section. Although it's hard to call as they're all nice, in my opinion.

It took us 3 hours (including stops) to complete the 4 and a half mile walk. After the walk was finished (and it was really hot by then) we had a quick coffee and then set off back home, calling in at Skipton on the way. There was a Farmers' Market at the Canal Basin... unfortunately the Farmers were all packing up to go home by the time we arrived (about 3pm).

So we wandered into the High Street (via an ice cream shop) and then back down the canal. From Skipton all the way to the A1 at Harrogate we were stuck behind the same red coach. It was driving me crackers! But finally we arrived home, tired, but feeling that we'd achieved something today.