Gerries to Gerryland

 Noon ferry from Portsmouth to Fishbourne.  Adrian looks a bit suspicious about the idea of going on holiday with his in-laws, Pa looks a bit more enthusiastic about the idea.

Sisters on tour enjoying the sun and sea breeze aboard the St Cecelia.

First stop Osborne House after some interesting circular navigation from Siri.

This is the Swiss Cottage which is a short walk from the house by schematic diagram and a long walk via the beach in reality.  Don't go there if you only have a few minutes spare before you head off home.






The Isle of Wight maybe on a time cycle about 30 years behind mainland Britain but its a staunch outpost of capitalism.  Material printed for the visitor seems to completely ignore attractions that have not paid to be there.  Osborne House doesn't make it onto my tea towel but the Hovercraft (which must have had a long contract) is.  After Osborne House we made our way to the hotel and on to dinner on the Shanklin Esplanade.
Up for an early breakfast and onto the Model Village at Godshill, the highlight of my visit.  Beautifully maintained gardens with quirky and witty scenes of well fed people going about their busy lives getting married, going on Scout camp, playing football (with a streaker on the pitch) or athletics and lots more.

 Beside the model village in the model village.

 Alison beside the show jumping arena.

Seasoned Scout master and Akela salute the Scout camp.

Bed of the king who loses his head.

The famous cock headed man

Not famous normal headed men

Shanklin Chine

Barbados 2013

One dreary winter morning last winter an email from British Airways lured Adrian and I into booking a holiday in paradise, also known as Barbados.   It was such an amazing break we did something we've never done before and booked exactly the same holiday again this year.  There was a niggle in my mind that repeating the experience might break the spell, I needn't have worried.
A group of very lucky staff from a Manchester IT company arrived and the hotel on the same day as us.  They were being treated by their (world's best) boss to 5 days in Barbados (about 20 of them, can't imagine what they must have done to deserve it).  It was a bit wasted on at least one of them who seemed to have misunderstood where she was.  Overheard speaking to a friend in the UK, very loudly (fuelled by rum) 'the Jamaicans on the boat were great.'  I wonder if she ever found out she wasn't in Jamaica.
Anyway I'm sure it was their block booking that got us allocated a better room so we were delighted by their good fortune.
Slight concern when we arrived at Grantley Adams airport and weren't able to produce our transfer voucher.  Fortunately we were on the list so got our ride but when we got to the hotel they were not so trusting and only thanks to free WiFi did I manage to find the email with the link to the hotel voucher.  I will try to remember to print the vouchers next time I go on holiday.

No submarines or round the island tours this time but we had the most amazing experience watching a sea turtle climb up the beach and nest.
A hotel security guard had an infra red torch and I know the picture is hard to interpret but here she is covering her eggs.  I contacted the Barbados Sea Turtle Project and they are going to let me know of the progress of this nest.
Barbados is a place where getting around and nourishing yourself is either very expensive or very cheap, nothing in between.  Horrified at the quote of $30 Barbados (about £10) for a 3 mile taxi ride back to the hotel (way too hot and humid to walk) we went for the reggae bus instead at $2 each.  Apparently these buses are privately owned and they are all quite different.  All the ones we went on had the loud music and some had a conductor who hangs out the door drumming up business as you progress at flat out speed, quite unlike London Transport.  We travelled on one bus where the speedometer had been removed and replaced by a piece of paper and another had a perspex sort of honesty box instead of the outdoor conductor.  Very convenient, casual, cheap and sometimes terrifying way of getting around.
We a few couples in the hotel who had been returning year after year (one couple were there for their 20th time) and I would have found this a bit odd in the past but ItI'm all for repeating this experience again next year if we can.  I recommend this holiday to anyone with batteries in need of recharging - this really did the trick.

World Book Night 2013 - quiz and fish and chip supper in Horsham

 is World Book Night on St George's day?
Because it is the birth (and death) day of William Shakespeare.
That's one of the 67.5 questions The Hillsiders got right.  Barry, Clive, Lisa, Sarah and Sue (with interloper Adrian) came 3rd overall (2nd of non library teams) out of 8 or 9 teams so we improved quite considerably after the first 6 or 7 questions that none of us had a clue about.  It was a bit touch and go to begin with and we started to wonder if we might have to slope off at the interval.
We learned that crime is where it's at in the world of literary quiz fodder and that we didn't read enough of it.
We recklessly answered 'Sense and Sensibility' to one of the questions because that's the book we are reading this month, rather than Pride and Prejudice which was clearly the right answer.  Fortunately that lost point was redeemed by knowing Miss Marple's first name.
Other teams seemed to be drinking home made lemon squash and took up the offer of cups of tea at the interval enjoyed their evening rather demurely.  By contrast the Hillsiders, who each brought their own bottle of wine gradually got louder as the evening progressed with a crescendo of exuberance when Michael Frayn turned out to be Claire Tomalin's husband.
Thanks to Horsham Library for organising the event.  Last year's cuddle from Peter James was lovely but this year's quiz included the opportunity to eat greasy food and make a noise inside the library, it was great fun and we all got a book to take home.
Tip for the movie round in a literary quiz - watch the credits at the end of a film and take note of who wrote the book.
As a WBN giver I have 24 copies of Red Dust Road to give away this year to 24 lucky readers so look out for me in the next week or so, it could be you.
I hope they let us enter next year - we might need to use an assumed name though.

Las Vegas - March 2013

Nobody believed it would ever actually happen, eight ladies going to Las Vegas, Nevada to celebrate Marguerite's 40th birthday but here are four of the eight in a taxi on the way to Heathrow to board flight BA0275 to McCarran International.

Alison and I had been so organised we were ready ahead of time and waited impatiently with our modest sized suitcases for the taxi.  We got to Heathrow and met our travelling companions who all but one seemed to be going on a much longer holiday. 

The six bottles of duty free prosecco came in very handy as pre dinner drinks but the, now well travelled, bottle of Vodka remains unopened awaiting the next book club meeting.

After 10 and a half hours aloft in a plane with a sound system that prevented any enjoyment of the in flight entertainment we finally arrived in the dessert.  On the way back I tried my own earphones and discovered that to be the problem so I got to see Argo after all (very good film by the way, highly recommended).

Following a slight delay waiting for the the second limo we set off for the Bellagio.  Our driver did not stop talking from the moment we set eyes on him until the moment we shut him up with a tip.  If only we had known we could have tipped at the beginning of the journey and travelled to the hotel in peace.  The only time he didn't comment was when we were stopped at an intersection and (Jodie I think) mentioned that this was the intersection where a fatal shoot out had happened recently.

Everything in Vegas is geared towards getting you and your wallet into the casino - even the lift.

We managed to stay up until after midnight on the night of our arrival.  We looked around the hotel, made a donation to the casino and had a snack at one of the restaurants in the hotel.  This was our introduction to the enormous American portion sizes.  We didn't ever seem to learn that one meal would easily feed 3 or 4 - I'm sure more food gets thrown away in America than gets eaten.

Thursday morning bright and early we crossed the road to breakfast in Paris.  Not very French but delicious non the less and so good to be able to sit outside without a coat, hat, scarf and gloves.

Spot of sunbathing beside lovely pool with purple bikini clad waitresses delivering frozen margaritas as $15 each and interesting mix of American guests to eavesdrop on.  Two late middle aged ladies in (very expensive looking) identical swimsuits with matching wraps and full battle makeup and a New York princess discussing the price of her bikini with her dad! 

After changing and having the holiday argument with Alison over who was going to wear her gillet we got our transport for the horseback riding experience.  Short drive from hotel and you are in the desert, literally in the middle of nowhere.  Being English we all wore the helmets provided unlike our guides in cowboy hats.  One and a half hour ride through red rock up and down narrow path in single file.  Very peaceful and enjoyable, fortunately I wasn't near the wrangler, another one of those chatty friendly types who cant bear any silence or the sound of anyone else's voice. 

As the sun started going down we came around a bend towards the corral and there were two ancient men with guitars standing on the top of the ridge singing 'Home on the Range' to welcome us back.  They kept up the singing until we escaped for our return trip.  Outsize steak and baked potato eaten we sat around a firepit outside to make and enjoy toasted marshmallows between two chocolate chip cookies (it should have been Graham crackers - we didn't get an explanation why it wasn't).  I'm still cleaning bits of marshmallow off my phone.

Friday morning the four helicopter girls went to Serendipity, part of Caesar's Palace for breakfast.  Nice tea served in biggest cups known to man and each breakfast was easily big enough to feed all 4 of us.  Good job we ate a lot because lunch provided by Maverick Helicopters turned out to be miniscule. 

Three reasons to avoid Las Vegas - fortunately there are lots of other things to do. 

I wonder what Augustus would have made of Las Vegas?

Helicopter trip over Hoover Dam and on to Grand Canyon was amazing.  Very noisy so you had to wear ear muffs and the refreshments were a little odd but fantastic experience.  We landed in the canyon for champagne (domestic) and lunch (celery stick, few grapes, 2 Ritz crackers and small portion of processed cheese).  Pilot was chatty but not exhaustingly so and having promised ourselves we would not tip due to the extortionate cost of the trip we succumbed to his charm and tipped him anyway.

We were travelling in the newest of the Maverick fleet, apparently costing $3 million.  The very high tech looking piece of wool in this picture is to indicate whether you are flying straight apparently even if it looks as though the pilot snagged his jumper on the way in.

Could this be the only completely square golf course in the world?

Alison, Jodie, Sara-Jane and I got back to the hotel before the Jeep girls and decided to go for a cocktail at Olives while waiting for the others.

Dinner was delicious and the fountains in the background every 15 minutes kept reminding us where we were.  Unfortunately the waiter was not much of a photographer.

After dinner we went into the casino for a little flutter, very successfully in my case.  

Queueing for The Bank (nightclub) is a very odd experience that seems to make no sense.  Bouncer upsets Laura resulting in our fast track with free drinks, still have no idea what any of it was about.

Saturday morning back to Serendipity for breakfast.  Spring Break, college football and St Patrick's day weekend meant the whole place was heaving and we had to queue for a table this time. After breakfast we went to the Mirage to and went into the zoo to see the tigers and other cats and the dolphins.  Set off back for the hotel past various people in all sorts of costumes were hanging around having their pictures taken for tips.

I decided to do some shopping and got lost in the Forum shopping centre.  Got back just in time to change and set off for the birthday dinner at Stratosphere.

Another waiter who can't take photographs.

Great meal in revolving restaurant that provides a great view of the whole town.

Another interesting element of the meal was the bungee jumpers going past the window while we dined.  Only in Vegas!

Limo from Stratosphere to Fremont St.  Helen & I play giant slot machine (without success), queue too long for Jodie to do zip wire.

On to Treasure Island for Sirens show!

Back to Bellagio.

Sunday morning arranged for an extra half day on one of the rooms then back to Paris for breakfast followed by quick tour to Mandalay Bay, Luxor and Excalibur hotels.  Saw the sharks, komodo dragon and touched the rays at Mandalay Bay.  Monorail between these 3 hotels then cab back to Bellagio past New York New York.

Another frozen margarita by the pool and top up of vitamin D before setting off to the airport and back to the cold and rain.

Overall verdict - brilliant venue, lovely company - 10 out of 10!  Where to next?

Goodbye 2012 - welcome to 2013

What a year 2012 was!  A few highlights:

The Hanagan's Heroes book club started in January and is still going strong with 10 books under its belt in 2012:

Alice, Eva Hanagan

Pickwick Papers, Charles Dickens

Warhorse, Michael Mapungo

Alone in Berlin, Hans Fallada

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, Maggie O'Farrell

Charlotte St, Danny Wallace

Notes From the Underground, Fyodor Dostoyevsky 

Our Spoons Came from Woolworths, Barbara Comyns

The Care of Wooden Floors, Will Wiles

Gents, Warwick Collins

The Wreck of the Mary Deare, Hammond Innes

The Weight of Numbers, Simon Ings

The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen

The Minotaur takes a cigarette break, Steven Sherrill

The Ickenham book club reads for 2012 included

One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest, Ken Kesey and Robert Faggen
The Help, Kathryn Stockett
Roots, Alex Haley
Winter in Madrid, C J Sansom
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skoot

Me Before You, Jojo Moyes

Took my first trip to Ireland to participate in the SPAR Great Ireland Run in Dublin in April.

Joined 1340 people dressed as super heroes running dressed as various super heroes along the Brighton sea front in May.

I made my first (and hopefully not last) visit to the Caribbean and the beautiful island of Barbados in June.

Got soaked watching the river pageant on the Thames for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee and the next day attended a fantastic street party in Hillside in June.

The weather finally came out for Lawrence's 21st birthday in July.

The Olympics and Paralympics of London 2012 were stunning.  Being at Greenwich Park for the showjumping final was an amazing experience in August.

Discovered a clarinet teacher in my office and restarted my clarinet playing in October.

Returned to the Cape Verde islands after 36 years for a Xmas holiday in the sun in December.

What will 2013 bring?

Boa Vista

Lawrence was a little perplexed at the size of the seat and its proximity to the one in front.  On the way back the person in front complained that his knees were in her back - but there isn't a lot you can do about the length of your legs.

It was all worth it though because the resort was lovely, the sky was blue and we didn't see a cloud until we got to the (open air) departure area (couldn't call it a lounge) for the return journey.

Everyone knows what a keen reader Lawrence is.

Temple of Doom steps down from the jacuzzi area down into the pool. The steps come out in the archway (see picture below).

Slightly odd stone sunbeds.  Unsurprisingly there was no scramble to get a towel on these.

Abby and Lawrence on the bridge over the pool.  Suddenly it makes sense why university students would go on holiday with their mums. 

One of these Santa's is wearing an inflatable suit - can you guess which one? 

Christmas dinner, bangers and mash - Pity they couldn't even stump up a glass of fizz for the xmas day flight, especially as they don't permit consuption of your own alcohol on board.  No frills air travel is to be endured as a means to an end.