Back in the UK

2/12 Glasgow with the Nobles

We all slept like kings in their 5 star hotel heated throughout whilst the snow and sleet added a soft dusting to the overnight fall.  Our best bed since January 2012.

Carol made a porridge for brekkie after which we rugged up to take a walk through the neighbouring woods & gardens where we simply couldn’t get enough of the patterned frozen leaves, the puddles converted to fairy ice-rinks, frozen ponds where ducks crazily crash landed skidding about, delicious looking pebbles which when coated in icicles looked like crystallized ginger and our noses turned painfully red & streamed madly.

snow angels

Angus and Wil

Kel and Finlay

We collected David from his teen sleep in and skated the short distance to the local pub for an Italian lunch, served by real Italians with Glaswegian accents.

The rest of the day was spent playing, talking by the fire, and eating dessert.  We decided to go to bed earlier at midnight. 

3/12  SWATMAN’S in Leeds/Bradford

The Noble kids woke in the dark, shrugged off breakfast and wandered into the quiet eerie snowed streets, guided only by moonlight to catch their 0745 school bus.  Impressive, understated, superwoman Carol zipped off in glam stylish gear for powerful meetings in Edinburgh & we indulged in more chats with Jimmy waiting for our hire car, a 4WD Honda CRV to arrive at Steve’s.  Whilst costing more, Jeff made an excellent decision because of these unfamiliar driving conditions with sleet, ice, early dark at 1630 and all day low (blinding) sun.

midday sun

5 hours later, we and our brilliant passengers arrived at Leed’s hospital where we were surprised by a bright eyed, remarkably healthy looking Steve and a pretty & elegant as ever Glen, all ready to walk out in the cold to their favourite nearby Chinese.  To see Steve’s eyes so full of sparkling life and his mouth bent to a perpetual grin was a surprise to us, and a testament to his underlying spirit, and the ever present magnificence of his wise, loving wife Glen.  What a year they’ve had - wall to wall needles, tests, scans, infusions, transfusions, pain, vomiting, diarrhoea, temporary blindness, CMV, good news then bad - hopefully it’s all good news from here.

   

At the restaurant Wil held the floor, conversing energetically with such large curious eyes with folk that just drank up his travelling stories.  Afterward, Glen took us back to Steve’s MIL’s apartment where we crashed in a studio for only 6 pounds.

4/12  OXFORD

We slurped more divine porridge (the kid’s with a huge tablespoon of nutella stirred through) back at Glen’s and passed time too quickly sharing European travel yarns with a like minded, generous and intelligent woman.  We really hope she and Steve make it back to Oz.  Back in the car, we drove for another 4-5 hours past Giggleswick, Wigglesworth, and Kidlington. (all BK towns of course) before  arriving right in the heart of gorgeous gracious old Oxford.  Kel recounted a scene from a book as we drove and mispronounced ‘corgy dog”.  When Jen corrected her and mentioned the Queen has two, Wil exclaimed “really! Mum doesn’t have dogs so why does the Queen??!” 

An ancient tumbled down pub with sloping floors called the “White Horse” beckoned us in for a ‘linner’ of pies & mash by which time it was pitch dark (only 1630) and all the splendid Xmas lights & trees lined all the enchanting little cobbled alleyways.  We walked the small streets and maze of little arcades to the joyful chiming of the kid’s voices as the excitedly recognized scene settings for many of the Harry Potter movies.

Our room for the night was hidden behind a dry, dusty Best Western facade which Kel reckons was like Hermione’s bag, for inside was a plump Xmas tree, a toasty reception staffed by a soft round warm spirited woman with welcoming lounge room like bars and breakfast rooms coming off the sides.  Our family suite was magnificent with juicily dressed beds (the kids even had one each), floorspace enough to dance around and a……..bath.

So we thawed out, cleaned up and crawled into bed at the ridiculous hour of 1800.

5/12  OXFORD to TONBRIDGE (in Kent)

Today we had that enormous full English breakfast minus fibre and then walked into Oxford to explore the largest English bookshop in the world (Blackwells), only some of the many colleges (the finest of which was Christchurch where HPs college hall is) gorgeous Christopher Wren architecture, examination halls, more HP back streets and fields with large shallow frozen puddles that the ducks still attempted crash landings.  As we walked the covered market, Wil kicked off an impassioned discussion of how he plans to come here to live & study even down to the detail of working part-time in the cake decorating shop. 

Harry on a wedding cake??

Another 3-4 hour drive against the killer low sun flickering through the tall bare trees, and midnight darkness by 1630 took us into Quentin Gallie’s small town of Tonbridge where we checked into another wonderful B&B with huge soft beds.  Quent took us to his wonderful ‘local’ with the characteristic fit out having one feel one is in someone’s lounge room around a toasty fire whilst Caitlin had a biology tutor visit and Elaine finished up some work.

Tonbridge Sunset

We were wined and dined with their house specialty of yummy spaghetti bolognese, skyped young Kieran in Copenhagen and chatted on famously ‘til late.

6/12  ROWDY’S

Feeling stuffed with food, we got up lazily, but struggling with mild URTI which is inevitable now having been in close company with people again.  We squeezed a coffee in with Quent in town before making our way into London’s Muswell Hill where Rowdy & Maria live in a huge magnificent home that bursts into life with the energies of three beautiful characters, Aiden (8), Jasmine (6) and Louie (4).  Our 2 added more fuel and the tornado of little people slid and screeched about the place before hitting bed allowing us 4 to enjoy an excellent lamb shank dinner.  We burnt the midnight oil once again but breaking it off was easier this time as their family is coming to Oz in 3 weeks where a pack of Jeff’s mates are planning a get together  - this time in the sun!

7/12  PLANES, TRAINS & AUTOMOBILES

Up with the Garske family at 0630 as they readied for school.  Rowdy and Maria had some morning time to share and Wil dropped his compliment of the year calling Jeff an archetypal Renaissance Man essentially being able to turn his hand & mind to anything!

Aiden - afebrile

We sorted the luggage AGAIN and put on a wash, rugged up and walked out in to the woods adjacent to their backyard.  Frozen silly after a few hours, we found our way into town and sniffed out a huge HOT lentil soup.  With a thermos in our bellies, we rolled back down to Rowdy’s, had a shower and massive chuck out of redundant winter things and made for the airport at 1400.  We got stuck on the northern ring around London, the world’s largest carpark making our 45 min trip into just under 2 hours. We had time.  A shuttle drove us for miles to the departure lounge from the car hire and then the usual London queues occupied us for a few hours.  Finally checked in, we welcomed a coffee and then Jeff ducked of to buy the kids a thank you gift we’d planned for months...he also bought himself a Xmas pressie of jolly impressive Beats headphones.

We climbed onto the plane twitchy and exhausted for doing NOTHING at 2100. Can’t wait for the otherside to run in the sun and eat fibre!