26^th June 2016

Dear All,

Street Pastors last night – hence the delay in this epistle. It was a reasonably quiet night with plenty of high spirits and drunkenness but no violence or even sickness. The number of rough sleepers in Cambridge has risen to over 150 with rumours of some cities giving homeless individuals one way tickets to Cambridge!

Last weekend there were open gardens in both Fenstanton and Swavesey. Kate and I visited 16 in Fenstanton and Kate had visited several in Swavesey plus an ambitious display based on “Food” in Swavesey church. Fenstanton had a special exhibit on Capability Brown as he lived there and it is 300 years since his birth.

Fenstanton Garden

On Monday we drove down to Hove and stayed until Tuesday night. Albert is now crawling and charming everyone with his smile – he seems to be a very cheerful chap. Amélie continues to enjoy school and is on daily countdown to her birthday in a couple of weeks.

On Tuesday we visited the Brighton Police Museum shown round by a retired policeman who was on duty during the Brighton bombing.

Our Thursday walk started at Sawtry and took in Hamerton and Steeple Gidding. We ended up rather damp due to rain and “sauna bath” humidity.

Preparing cricket wickets has been tricky finding dry interludes nevertheless I managed to cut and roll 3 strips on Friday morning and the 1^st XI played yesterday without interruption. At the same time there was a serious heavy in Swavesey and a serious hailstorm in Cambridge. Last night there was a carpet of green leaves under every tree.

I was judging Stapleford Fruit & Vegetable show yesterday. It is the smallest and least impressive show that I judge so it was not too exacting.

Just as we were leaving for Street Pastors last night I noticed we had a puncture, I had never changed a wheel on the Peugeot and it was a steep learning curve with nut caps, security bolts and a wheel that did not want to budge!.

We had a church lunch today to belatedly celebrate the Queen’s birthday. Conversations were dominated by “Brexit” which has divided opinion very sharply.

The following seems to cover the situation:

Love

Mike & Kate

19^th June 2016

Dear All,

The weather has had a fairly profound effect on events this week. On Wednesday the Police cancelled cricket because the weather forecast was dire. On Thursday we got damp walking and our annual Garden Party for the U3A “Just Vegetating” class was rudely interrupted by a downpour. In addition, RHS sent me a photo of a field where we have a trial in Spalding which was under water.

On Thursday we completed the “Lea Valley Walk” that we began in Luton in 2014. The plan had been to walk the last section through the Olympic Park in spring 2015 when the flowers were at their best. In the event this did not happen until last week. We started at Tottenham Hale and walked the tow path to the Olympic Park where we had booked a couple of blue badge guides for a tour. It began to rain more or less straight away so umbrellas were up and down like yoyos. The tour was very good and the efforts to use the park after the games seem very commendable. The admin block is being turned into offices and cafes, the Aquadrome is now a public swimming pool, numerous cycle tracks start from the Velodrome and, of course, West Ham have  been virtually gifted the main stadium. There has been a lot of planting since the games so the site looked very smart even in the rain. Goodness knows how many billions have been spent but it has certainly regenerated a scruffy area.

River Lea near Tottenham Hale

Velodrome

New planting

Aquadrome

Barge below Olympic Park

Canary Wharf Tower

Sky Garden

After lunch on the site we walked via Limehouse to Canary Wharf and the Thames culminating at the “Sky Garden”. I didn’t know that this existed but it is a splendid glass dome covered garden on the first floor of 20 Fenchurch Street, mainly planted with drought resistant plants.

On Friday we had an open garden and meal for 25 from our U3A course. Kate had prepared a splendid array and they had just settled down outside when it began to rain so they all ended up indoors. However it did not dampen spirits too much and it seemed to go well.

Love

Mike & Kate

12^th June 2016.

Dear All,

It has been a good growing week, hot and a few showers, so plenty of gardening prior to members of our U3A “Just Vegetating” coming for lunch next Friday. Yesterdays gardening was accompanied by our local tame Muntjac who seems fairly fearless and comes right up to you if you are still.

I took delivery of a “TomTato” and an “Egg & Chips” this week on special offer – they cannot have been selling too well. The former is a tomato grated onto a potato root and the later an aubergine on a potato.

Help?

Rockery

We pulled up the early over wintered Broad beans this week – they have had a phenomenal yield, I thought the frost would knobble them, but we had very little cold weather so they kept growing. Strawberries have been getting underway and most fruit crops look promising.

I did a Garden Club at Kempston beyond Bedford on Wednesday – they said “good job you were not here last night as we were underwater”.

Our Thursday walk started at Kirtling, south of Newmarket and took in Upend, Saxon Street and Woodditton. It started gloomy but finished in bright sunshine.

Near Woodditton

On Friday evening we had another tour of the RSPB reserve in Over Fen with the warden Hannah Bernie. We could hear Bitterns booming all evening and saw one flying in the distance. The most prominent birds were Marsh Harriers and at least one was in evidence all evening. They are about half way through the project of restoring the pits after gravel extraction, and seem to be doing a good job.

RSPB Gathering

Marsh Harrier

Ben flew off to Fiji on Friday, a 36 hour journey via Australia. We trust he has arrived safely and will stay healthy as the girl he is meeting has had Zica virus.

Love

Mike & Kate

5^th June 2016.

Dear All,

On Wednesday Kate and I had a “Quality Time” day out walking the Colchester Heritage Trail. It started at Hollytrees Museum then to the Castle, Dutch Quarter, Quaker Alley, St Martin’s, Town Hall, Fire Office, St Peter’s, Jumbo Water Tower, Balkerne Gateway, Roman Wall, St Mary’s, Sir Isaac’s walk, St Botolph’s, East Hill, Minories and back to Hollytrees. Although it was my nearest town growing up, I had not explored it in detail and there is, of course, more history than you can shake a stick at. We started to walk to the Hythe while we were en route, but it was too far and eventually we gave up and drove there after completing the tour.

Castle

15^th Century Building

St Botolph’s ruins

The Hythe Docks

We had serious rain on Tuesday, which we needed, but it did not dry out all week. It cheered the garden and allotment up but made wicket preparation very tricky. I stripped the shelving and propagator out of the greenhouse during the downpour and planted peppers in the cleared area. Meanwhile the allotment has been filled with squash and the garden with sweet corn –so no spare land at present!

Kate and I led the walk at Radwinter on Thursday. It was an interesting walk but several of the paths were not very clear with chest high damp foliage. The rain had made bare land very sticky and the path crossed a field with a large bull who fortunately chose to run away.

Radwinter

Bull & Harem

Challenging Undergrowth

We visited one of the church members in Addenbrookes on Friday; Jan Few is a large man who has had a hip replacement. A lung collapsed while he was under anaesthetic so he was relieved to fell as well as he did.

Love

Mike & Kate