A Few Hours In The Fields

Ever since we moved to Suffolk I have been itching to try the metal detector on the fields near our house. I've had a few detecting hours with a friend on fields near where he lives but those near us have been full of crops until this week when the harvest got under way. A local farmer has kindly given me permission to try his farm and I hope to get some time out in between child minding visits to Rochester (I am writing from the Premier Inn there this evening). 

This was the result of just over two hours with the XP Deus. There's quite a lot of rubbish there but there are four or five buttons, a lead weight and an old coin.

I haven't managed to identify the coin yet but it is a medieval silver hammered penny and will date from around 1200. Hopefully I will be able to get a positive i.d in the near future. I'm pleased to have found this coin as it shows that the field was in use hundreds of years ago and it could well hold more coins and artefacts from the last thousand years. I'm looking forward to trying again before we head up to Scotland for the arrival of our third grandchild in September.

I also found this decorative cast shell. I don't think it is particularly old but it will look good in the finds cabinet.

Today we headed to Tunbridge Wells to meet old friends Wyndham and Lesley Westaway. We met them in 1986 when we lived in Edenbridge and our children became friends. It was great to hear all about their family - a lot has happened in the ten or more years since we last met. Although we are not exactly on their doorstep now, we are a lot closer than we were in Southport and I hope that we are able to catch up with them again soon.

The Road Trip Continues

We left the AA Pub Of The Year 2012/13, The Black Swan in Ravenstonedale, on Wednesday morning after three nights of relaxation. It's a pub that's well worth all the accolades, with good food, pleasant surroundings and, above all, extremely friendly and helpful service. I think it's that side of the business that tipped the awards in The Black Swan's favour although a beer drinker might well tell me that the fabulous variety of fine ales that they serve may also be a factor.

From Ravenstonedale we had a leisurely drive to Sedbergh before a quick stopover in the lovely town of Kirkby Lonsdale for a coffee and a bit of shopping. We then headed for Ribchester to visit friends Mark and Nita who joined  us for dinner at The White Bull in nearby Alston before putting us up for the night in a very comfortable bed. Staying in a house was a nice change from the Premier Inn. 

On Thursday it was a short drive to nearby Southport where we stayed with my mum for the night and enjoyed some of her delicious home cooking. It was good to see Mum for the first time in four months and we look forward to stopping over in Southport again in a month or so en route to Suffolk again.

Friday saw us in Ormskirk visiting our old friends Dave and Jane Haworth. Marion headed off to Liverpool for a little bit of shopping in her favourite stores with best friend Jane. Dave and I joined them later for a dinner at San Carlo. It's an extremely brash and busy place - perfect for people watching. You would never guess that the country's economy is in some sort of slump; the place was heaving at five p.m. and was jam packed for the rest of the evening. It's a great place to go and we must thank Dave and Jane for their generosity in treating us to the meal.

After a good night's sleep in Ormskirk we headed back to Southport to collect our car which we had left for a service having done 14,000 miles in a few months. We got the garage to fit a full set of tyres; although they weren't quite ready to be changed it's getting colder and we're likely to see icy roads soon. I don't want to put our lives at risk for the sake of saving a few quid.

We were in Southport to attend our old Instanta colleague Nick Neal's surprise 50th birthday party. Nick, pictured above with his lovely daughters Laura and Millie who worked so hard to make the party a big success, enjoyed a great night with plenty of friends, colleagues and customers (who have also become friends) many of whom had travelled miles to be there. 

We enjoyed meeting plenty of old colleagues again (including Craig above) after Liz's party last Saturday. I won't embarrass anybody with photos of the later revelry. Suffice to say, a good time was had by all.

Today we headed off from Southport to Suffolk and I'm writing this from the Premier Inn in Ipswich where we are now regulars. Off to meet the builder in Framlingham tomorrow to see how things are progressing. 

Framlingham Update

We got up at 5 a.m. and arrived safely in Framlingham at 2.45 p.m. today. We had arranged a meeting with the builder and architect to bring us up to date with progress.

The sun tunnels have brightened up a very gloomy landing and filled it with sunlight. This small dingy corridor was one of our major worries with the house and we're really pleased that we agreed to go with the Velux Tunnels. They are fitted with internal lights too so when the sun sets they can be used as straightforward lights but in this photo the electric lights are off.

The house is a lot smaller than our old one and I wanted some space to sit and write and also to keep my metal detecting stuff so we went for an office in the garden. The office from Finnish Log Homes is coming along very nicely and should be complete when we travel down south again in a couple of weeks.

The corner of the house has been removed to make way for the sliding folding doors and the builders are closing up a door and opening up a window to make way for a new window and French Doors which are due to arrive on 22 October.

They are making good progress on the kitchen diner too. It's going to be a lovely bright room. Tomorrow we've got a day with the interior designer and the kitchen designer and before we head back up the motorway to the caravan the interior design should be virtually finished. 

Next time we visit the property we're meeting a landscape designer to plan the garden.

It's unlikely that we will manage to move into the property this year but we hope that we will be settled in by the end of January. We'll have to as the caravan site closes in February for a month.

A Flying Visit To Suffolk

As I write, we're back in the Premier Inn in Ipswich on a quick trip to Suffolk to see how the house renovation is progressing. We got up at five thirty and were on the road at six; if it had not been for an accident on the A14 we would have arrived in time for our appointment with the interior designer who is helping us with our decor but the road was closed near St Ives and we had to detour almost seventy miles out of our way and arrived at her studio in Woodbridge via the M25 - but only fifteen minutes late.

Tomorrow we're heading for Framlingham in the morning and back to Ipswich in the afternoon for another meeting with the designer and then we're back on the road for another four hundred mile drive back to St Andrews. Fortunately we've time for a lie in in the morning to make sure that we are fresh enough to complete the journey. We share the driving so, whilst an eight hour drive is daunting, a four hour drive each is not too onerous. 

Before our long drive, our more relaxing week in Scotland continued and on Saturday we had a lovely day out with Sarah and Rose and visited a rare breeds farm with a playground just outside St Andrews and then went on to the superb renaissance style Falkland Palace - a great piece of architecture in a small and picturesque village.

  
There's so much to see in and around St Andrews that I'm sure we'll find plenty to keep us occupied in between our treks up and down the motorways. Later this week we're heading to the Edinburgh Fringe. We've got tickets for The Boy With Tape On His Face - More Tape, Sean Hughes - Life Becomes Noises and Sarah Kendall - Get Up Stand Up which will take up the late afternoon and evening. Hopefully we will find a few more offbeat acts to try earlier in the day and, as it's not a fasting day, somewhere good to eat.

Speaking of the fasting regime. It's been a fasting day today and we've had three cups of tea without milk, a banana and strawberry smoothie and half a cheese and ham sandwich each - when I finish writing this I plan to study the Premier Inn's breakfast menu in anticipation of an eating day tomorrow.

Well that’s the first few steps of our great adventure over.

Amazing how much you can get in a Prius

Premier Inn Ipswich

We completed the sale of the house in Southport last week and headed down to Suffolk with the car heaped high with all the essentials for our next four months whilst all our non-essential possessions headed into store. We felt like a couple of tramps turning up at the Premier Inn in Ipswich after a first night stay at a Days Inn on the M6. But we had little choice as we needed to appoint a builder for the work in Framlingham as quickly as possible or risk pushing the start date for the renovations back even further.

We got the builder appointed by Friday and made good progress with the kitchen, windows, outside office and interior design so we’re looking at the work starting in less than three weeks when the house will begin getting knocked about. Before then we’ve got to try and come up with some bathroom ideas which is not easy as the rooms are very small and we’ve little scope for mistakes.

The beautiful art nouveau frontage to Norwich Royal Arcade

We even found time to do a bit of sightseeing at the weekend and visited the renowned Anchor at Walberswick for a fabulous fish lunch before taking the rowing boat ferry across to Southwold where we enjoyed a walk down the pier and around the town. On Saturday we had a look around Norwich – what a great city!  There’s a great variety of shops, a wonderful market, a castle, loads of places to eat, modern shopping malls, old shopping lanes, independent bookshops (and a good Waterstones) and so much more. We’ll certainly be making regular visits when we finally get to live in East Anglia.

After the relative peace of the weekend we sorted out the giant Leylandii in our new garden that was offending our neighbours; we had it felled at a cost of well over £300 and we hope it’s earned us a foot on the ladder of acceptance in our new neighbourhood. There’s no longer any chance of the tree causing us future disputes. Leylandii have been at the centre of so many huge rows between neighbours; I’ve seen it referred to as “the tree at the centre of suburban warfare” and it’s no surprise – they grow to phenomenal heights.

After that it was back on the road again and that meant another Premier Inn; this time it was Rochester where Paul and Josephine have just bought their new house. It’s a super old Grade 2 listed building with lots of big rooms (their house that is not the Premier Inn) and it’s a perfect new home for our furniture that either won’t fit in our new place or won’t suit its more modern style. It was fortuitous that Paul and Josephine’s purchase came within a few days of our sale so the Rochester house will be furnished and ready for them to move into as soon as yet another huge event (the birth of their first baby) happens.

After we oversaw the delivery of the furniture (well done McDowells Removals – can’t recommend them highly enough) Josephine and her mum Jenny came and we spent some time together getting things unpacked.

Marion Jenny And Josephine At The Rochester House

It was our thirty-sixth wedding anniversary and we got this super bottle of champagne from Paul and Josephine. Although they bought us some picnic flutes to drink it from, the Premier Inn rooms don’t run to a fridge, so we’ve saved it for this weekend. It was strange being within a stone’s throw of where we got married (Chatham) on our anniversary. We didn’t feel up to going out as we were tired and our clothes were starting to look a bit of a mess so we dined in the Premier Inn. It was only regular chain restaurant stuff but it was served with a smile and was perfectly acceptable.

That night we had the chance to check out Premier Inn’s good night sleep guarantee. We were in one of those rooms that links to another by way of a door. And behind that door was someone who managed to snore loudly from around 2am until we got up at 6.30. I told the receptionist and within a couple of minutes my £65 was refunded with no fuss whatsoever (I managed to record the snoring on my phone but although the receptionist listened to the recording I am sure that he would have taken my word alone). So, well done Premier Inn. We stayed with them for seven nights in all and if you are looking for a budget hotel chain with clean rooms, friendly service and okay food you don’t need to look any further.

After our sleepless night we took delivery of a bed at the Rochester house and then set off back up north – after a delay when we witnessed a minor accident and stopped to help out. We made a brief stop at a kitchen showroom in Ipswich and then headed to St Andrews where we managed to get our head down in the caravan before 1am.

As we unpacked the car this morning the car seemed to groan with relief and it finally looks like a car again. Now we're looking forward to some quality time with Sarah, Duncan and Rose.