Ode to Guinness

In honour of St. Patricks' Day, we thought it would be fun to reminesce about how we all celebrated last year.

While we enjoyed ourselves in a pub in Cambridge with our good friends Adeline and Thierry, Guinness had other ideas as to how to most appropriately celebrate St. Patrick's Day. Looking back, we think there was a slight hint of jealousy since we spent so much time with that 'other Guinness'.


Alas, another opportunity has arrived to celebrate St. Pat's Day in style. We're going out in London with CW's friend from study abroad Denise and her boyfriend who are here visiting. Perhaps tomorrow will see another bout of destructive Guinness behaviour.

Go Ireland!

Gorhambury House

Gorhambury is an old house located just minutes from our house. There is a wonderful road which makes its way up towards it past fields of sheep.

If it were not for the strict lead rules, it would be a perfect place for us to walk Guinness (the sheep are behind fences), but at least it makes for a good weekend stroll once in a while and an excellent running route for CW.


Unfortunately the one weekend we've been able to walk up there so far it was closed to the public but hopefully one of these days we can get inside to tour it as it's supposed to be really pretty.

Home Sweet Home

Finally a few pictures of our new little home... none from upstairs as of yet since we are still awaiting our bed and wardrobe so it's a bit of a mayhem up there with clothes hanging off every doorknob and nook and cranny.

Anyway, just sharing another piece of our little life here as so many have requested... hopefully you can all come and see it in person soon!!
If you look closely you'll see a faint red arrow pointing at the road where our lane comes in...

Our new life

So after the hoopla of a three day moving weekend – that’s one day for packing, one day for moving and one day for unpacking – we were back to work on the Monday morning. The new commute, how would we fair? Well on Monday it went fairly routinely. Yes our muscles were a bit worse for wear after the weekend and the twenty minute walk up and over the hill that sits between our house and the train station, especially after living in the aforementioned flat Fenland. We thought, well this won’t be so bad, but then Thursday came and the first proper snowfall we have had in our entire 2.5 years in England.

There were fears of massive transport delays, see our blog If a tree falls. Yet, all in all the trains were running smoothly, if five minutes late when I reached St Albans station. Now, I went in early due to a meeting I was meant to have at 9 that morning. I was perfectly on schedule until a train completely broke down at one of the stations ahead on the line, thus stranding me in a tunnel for an hour and forty-five minutes. Great thing about being trapped in a tunnel, yeah, no mobile phone reception.

So, I arrive well after my meeting, especially since the Tube was all buggered up and I had to walk 30 minutes in the slush from Kings Cross to my office. Oh well, the joys of snow in a country that just can’t deal with exceptional weather, ironic no? Meanwhile, Cora who decided to linger a while in the snowy park, managed to take a train well after me and avoid all of this by getting off at an earlier station and arriving to work more than an hour before me. Such is the commuter’s life – but at least we were able to get some pictures out of it (see above).

We are all three of us enjoying it so far. We live in a nice two-bedroom cottage in the old section of the city. Not quite as old as the Roman settlement, but old none the less. Just a minute from the park, Guinness is quite pleased with the speed at which he is free to run around chasing bunnies who are far more brazen than their cousins were in Waterbeach - and he's already had some up close and personal encounters with a number of birds, ducks, swans you name it. He's getting pretty good at ignoring them and just watching now... (note the ducks sitting to his left)

We are spoilt for choice in terms of restaurants and pubs, two of which flank the entrance to our small Lane. It is called a lane, but really should be classed more as a Mews, which to those in the States is like a non-seedy alley. (The picture below isn't exactly our street, but it's what we see looking up to the right as you come out on our way to the park)

There is an immense cathedral in St Albans located up on the hill. We walk past it everyday to and from work and have a wonderful view of it on our walks. This was our first morning walking and the mist and frost had a beautiful effect on the scene before us which isn't quite represented here but it's close.

So that is that really. We have spent a fair amount of time over the last two weeks settling into our new digs and trying to sort out our storage and space issues. Now that we have just had our internet re-connected our ability to communicate with the outside world will vastly increase.

So watch this space for future postings on our new set of adventures around the undulating countryside of Hertfordshire, England. And in the meantime, go to our website here for some more pictures as we post them!

On the move again

So, the nomads are moving once more, as is our wont in life. Another year (kind of), another new location. After the last year plus on the edge of the Fen Country outside Cambridge, we are off to the formerly Roman city of Verulamium, now known as St Albans. It is a quick 20 minute train ride to Kings Cross station, therefore far more suited to commuting than Waterbeach was.

Now as can be expected from people who have moved every year for the past decade, we are quite used to packing. Of course we are not the only ones:

Guinness is such a pro – this will be his sixth house in five years – that he is more than willing to lend a paw. Admittedly his efforts are usually not as productive and he often wanders about the house looking plaintively at the boxes. However once settled into the new place he is quick to make things his own:

He is shown here on the mattress, which up until our most recent move used to sit on a box spring and frame, but now just sits on the floor. The reason for this is when an American box spring meets an English staircase, the English staircase often wins. I wish I could say we fought the good fight, but really it was a very one-sided fight and in the end we were forced to retire to our lonely mattress.

All in all though it was a very expedient move, for which we must thank our good friend Rob for helping with, especially his skill at manoeuvring the twelve foot truck down our rather tiny Lane.

One last Waterbeach sunrise

After nearly a year and a half in the fine Fenland village of Waterbeach we had had enough of flat expanses and long commutes and decided to return to the greater London area.

After a fairly boring winter with mornings spent on the train instead of by the river, we were lucky enough to get a crisp, frosty morning with just a hint of foggy mist hanging over the river. It was the perfect way to end our time in this quiet little corner of England.

We will certainly miss the solitude by the river, though not necessarily all the cow pats! (note that's the moon in the picture below, not the sun... the beauty of the scene didn't really transfer in the photo but you get the idea!)

Our pictures of Waterbeach have moved here

If a tree falls...

People often remark that transport in London, and all across England for that matter, is a disaster. For the most part, we disagree with that. Having used it every day for the last two and a half years, the number of problematic journeys has been quite minimal for us.

While each autumn we are forced to endorse slower trains because of leaves on the track, we have never been truly inconvenienced by the reported 500,000 delay minutes that these leaves apparently cause (see further reading below).

Cartoon from Cartoon Stock

However, if one does agree that leaves do in fact cause such excessive delays, then imagine for a moment what entire trees on the tracks have the ability of causing. Below is such an example of one of the key stations in London providing overland and tube services. London Liverpool Street is, as a result, already a busy station where it is not uncommon to have masses of people. This however was an unusual mass of people.



And while delays and cancellations are in fact a frequent occurence, never before have I seen so much red on the board, signifying either a delay or cancellation.

Other stations across London experienced similar issues due to the 70mph winds which brought trees and power lines down and caused signal failures and all sorts of things. Getting home was yet another exciting adventure for most London commuters.

Suffice to say, our journey to Cambridge was delayed by a day, hence adding a total of 2,880 minutes to their ongoing count.

Further reading on The Guardian's website here

Ian's 60th Birthday Bash

Finally had some time to post some photos about our weekend away in Fayence, France to celebrate Ian's 60th Birthday. We had a fantastic weekend exploring the vineyards, golf courses, mills and pools of Provence and eating and drinking our way through wonderful French food and wine.

We rented a house with Bex, Rob, Nic, Steve, Austin, Mom and us. The house was gorgeous - and of true Provence style. The couple who owned it lived right next door and had a beautiful golden retriever Tess who was more than happy to come around and visit in the morning and evening.

The first day we set out for a couple of vineyards where we were given tours of where they make and store the wine. It was interesting since we were expecting old dark and damp cellars but instead found ourselves in front of large stainless steel tanks - even the French are modernising their old ways. We got to try several types of wine at each vineyard and were taught the tricks of wine tasting (so now us amateurs can at least attempt to look a bit more wine savvy when required). After the wine tasting at the first vineyard we were seated to a wonderful lunch outside, where of course, we were served their house wines.







Day 2 took most of us to the gorgeous Four Seasons Resort where we played 18 holes of golf. Considering we hadn't played in absolute ages (and had only barely managed to get a hold of golf shoes before going) - I, in particular, was a bit worried about how the day would play out, literally. Hitting the ball off the ground and into the air, isn't so much a problem, in fact it often goes quite far. The trouble is, the ball seems to prefer taking a 30 degree direction to the right which inevitably means my ball ends up in the water (what is it about golf courses and water on the right) or woods. Thankfully we were playing a Texas Scramble where each team member must have three or four (depending on the size of the team) drives count. The best ball is always played from there, so for those of us whose balls tend to end up in the woods or water, it was a very good thing. CW didn't have too much of a problem though and played quite well! All in all, the golf, scenery, weather and company were all fantastic and we really enjoyed ourselves!






After a day of fresh air out on the golf course, we went home and freshened up for the event we all came for - Ian's birthday dinner. The dinner was held where most people were staying in a beautiful old mill they had restored into a hotel and restaurant. They kept most of the original features and added some unique ones to add to the ambiance of the place. My favourite was the old mill tools they had cemented into the ground in the entrance and the old wood beams everywhere.

Dinner was wonderful and followed by some very amusing speeches which practically had Ian in tears. It was definitely a nice sight to see him so happy and relaxed and enjoying himself - most often Ian is seen at home on the couch after a long day at work or sport doing more work. Dinner, toasts, venue and company again were all very enjoyable and made for a lovely evening.






The day after Ian's birthday dinner, we all went to the Stopps' new house for some Sunday brunch. It was quite a spread, complete with some fantastic French meats and cheeses and of course French wine.


After we were all well fed and satisfied we took advantage of their pool and great views to relax for the rest of the afternoon.

And finally, once everyone had gone home, Ian, Alex, Pat, Les, CW and I relaxed in front of a beautiful sunset which ended a perfect weekend of birthday celebrations. Thanks everyone for a fantastic weekend, and again Ian, happy 60th!


More pictures are on my website here (password 'fayence')

Guinness and Friends

Morning kisses
The Three Stooges
Who said cows can't talk... here they are planning their attack

Stand off - 'now what do I do?!'
Don't leave us, please! You were so much fun!