Friday 1st April 2011
I always feel then when the midnight bell tolls on the 31st of March and we enter into a new Financial Year, wouldn't it be nice if we could just stop for a while - put our feet up for a couple of weeks - maybe come back to Brightwater Holidays in a couple of months? That would be nice, but I'm afraid it doesn't work that way. Anyway Financial year 2010/2011 is dead, long live Financial Year 2011/2012!
My mad week of whizzing round the country this week continued at a pace when on Tuesday Kay and I caught the train from Bristol Parkway to York, arriving just in time for a very convivial supper with our friends from the York Association of the National Trust or YANT as we like to call them.
http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-york-association-oct10.pdfIt is such a treat to visit York and to see its splendid Cathedral and to walk along the city walls which were covered in bright daffodils.
http://www.visityork.org/Over the years YANT have been great supporters of Brightwater Holidays and once a year we meet up with their members in York to hear suggestions where they would like to travel in the future and to have an opportunity to discuss any other related matters. It is always a lively forum and this year was no exception with an overflowing list of possible tour destinations ranging from the Isle of Man, to a Scottish Castles tour and even as exotic as South Africa. They are a very game lot in York! The meeting with the members was on Wednesday morning in a rather smart restaurant called MeltonsToo however while everyone followed the meeting with lunch Kay and I had to dash to catch the return train to Bristol. It was a horrible experience running some 40 minutes late, piled high with rubbish/litter, and from Birmingham to Bristol I had the pleasure of sitting next to an extremely fat man with the most hideous and continuous hacking cough - the joys of train travel.
Because we were running late, Kay had to dash home to collect the kids, and I had to dash to South Wales - to Llantwit Major (just west of Cardiff) to speak to their Gardening Club. It was a lovely spring evening crossing the Second Severn Crossing and it did strike me that it is quite symbolic driving into Wales over a bridge that it is probably no coincidence that it is like driving through two huge sets of ruby posts!
I had splendid directions from the Garden Club's Secretary with some good short cuts, so I arrived in time for a quick look around Llantwit Major and had time for a pint in a 500 year old pub 'The White Heart'. I had to duck to go through the small opening that was the door and it was quite dark once inside. When my eyes got accustomed to the light I could see it was very busy with people watching the obligatory Sky Sports Channel - then to my surprise the largest and hairiest man in Wales slapped his hand on my shoulder and said 'All right boy? Where are you from Lovely?'
This was the nearest I come to having a pint with a cross between Adam Jones, the Welsh Loose Head Prop and Hagrid from Harry Potter! Anyway he was a friendly chap who gave me a potted history of the pub and the town.
http://www.llantwitmajorvale.co.uk/My talk to the gardeners of Llantwit went well and I was pleased that I didn't have to pay to leave Wales, and I had had to pay to get in!
It was a little more leafy and rural last night in north Hampshire when I traveled down to Kings Somborne (not far from Winchester) - I was the 'turn' immediately after their Horticultural Society's AGM. Kings Somborne is the most beautiful village you can imagine in the heart of the Test Valley which runs from Andover to Southampton.
http://www.thesombornes.org.uk/phpgraphy/index.php The village has a large number of the most wonderful old thatched cottages one of which looked like it might belong to Bilbo Baggins!
Fortunately now when I visit garden clubs around the country as least it is light in the evening so I can get some idea of what the villages/towns are like - during the winter of course when I arrive it has been dark.
It was another late do, not getting home until after midnight.
A nice email was waiting in my in box this morning from a couple who were on our recent tour to Malta 'Dolman Hotel at St Paul's Bay service and food first class, Guide was excellent, all travel plans went on time - Another Brightwater Triumph!'
http://www.dolmen.com.mt/Thanks Martin and Joyce.
Hopefully a more sedentary week next week!
