30th September 2018

Dear All,

It took some time to get back to a normal sleep pattern – then we were on Street Pastors Friday night which again causes some disruption.

The garden had moved on during two weeks away and we were able to harvest good crops of tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and amazing late flushes of runner and French beans.

It is our Harvest supper and thanksgiving this weekend and I took Jim Burr for a ride to supplement supplies at Biggleswade. Jim was in the RAF with a keen interest in aeroplanes so I took him to Shuttleworth to view their collection. I hadn’t visited since University days when we used to play the local agricultural college at football, rugby and hockey. Jim can hardly walk these days and the collection was not especially wheelchair friendly, but he seemed to enjoy it.

I missed the Thursday walk – Kate went starting at Cottered, as it was cricket pitch winter preparation day. We had more help than usual which was as well as we are preparing two extra strips making it 7 in total. It was the familiar operation: cut, scarify, aerate, fertilise, reseed and add 70 bags of loam.

I returned the heavy roller to its winter parking place at Les Cook’s farm in the fen. He was a little upset as he had just had his first ever TB reactor on his Hereford herd. He makes a living selling breeding stock so it is very serious as he can only sell for slaughter until he has the all clear. He is not sure of the source of the infection but the number of badger setts has exploded locally so they are probably prime suspects.

Street Pastors was fairly lively Friday night as it was a payday weekend and some students have returned. However it was the street life which caused most problems including one who “helpfully” supervised our care of vomiting German girl with such comments as “Why weren’t you here sooner”, You should have the café open Friday as well as Saturday”, “You should pay for a taxi to get her home” and “Give her some chips to settle her stomach!”

It was Trevor & Daphne Grange’s 50^th wedding anniversary last Friday and they hosted a celebration at the White Swan yesterday afternoon – so no football!

In the evening the harvest supper speaker was the chairman of the Ely Food Bank Karl Relton.

Love

Mike & Kate

23rd September 2018

Dear All,

Well it might not have been the ideal time to visit the east coast of the USA! We were due in Charleston the same day as hurricane Florence and this caused a few adjustments. We were actually in Savannah a hundred miles to the south of Charleston when Florence eventually reached the coast of North Carolina and, of course, the TV stations went into meltdown! Our tour company decided that we should stay an extra two days in Savannah to see how things developed then we headed inland to try and circumvent the effects. This meant a long two days and between 800 and 900 miles via Chattanooga and Roanacre before getting back on schedule at Richmond. We did encounter some fairly severe rainfall and when we were in Richmond we were hit with one of the tornadoes on the tail of the hurricane. Apart from that it was a very interesting tour and we know much more about American history than we did before!

The tour started at Atlanta where we visited the Olympic park, the Martin Luther church, museum and memorial, Margaret Mitchell’s house, Stone Mountain, the CNN complex, Coca Cola tour and the top of Westin hotel tower at 72 stories. Atlanta was better than we imagined but dominated by some serious skyscrapers!

Atlanta from the top of the Westin Hotel

Next stop was Savannah on the coast of Georgia. The town was laid out on a grid pattern with a series of squares. The old centre is largely unchanged but it is a very busy container port as well. It was very hot and humid, perhaps enhanced by the proximity of the hurricane. We had a horse and carriage tour of the town, walked most of the squares, visited the cathedral and most of the museums in town, took a trip up river on a pseudo paddle steamer and were upgraded into the rather grand Hyatt for our two extra days. It is an interesting town but we were running short of things to visit after four days!

The Georgia Queen

At Chattanooga in Tennessee, we took the Incline Railway to the top of Lookout Mountain and visited the Choo Choo station – now a hotel. Next day was a gruelling 524 miles in 11.5 hours to Richmond – the sort of day which makes you need a holiday to recover from!

On the Road

The Incline Railway

From Richmond in Virginia, we visited Jamestown, the site of the first European settlement and Williamsburg an important town in the Revolutionary war which has been largely preserved in its former condition. We started a tour of Richmond but this was cut short by the arrival of a tornado which demolished a building or two accompanied by more serious rain.

Williamsburg

Next it was Monticello, former home of Thomas Jefferson and his famous vegetable garden – which was one of the main reasons we signed up for this tour. It was very interesting for me having prepared a biography presentation on Jefferson last year. The garden was OK bit a bit soggy and wind blown due to the recent weather.

Monticello, Jefferson’s Garden

We headed for Washington DC that night and had a conducted tour next day including Arlanda cemetery and JFK’s grave, the Lincoln memorial, the Vietnam wall  and Korean 19 soldiers garden, the Washington monument, the White House (Donald was not at home!), Lafayette square, the National Mall and the Capital. In the afternoon we showed ourselves round three of the Smithsonian museums: Air & Space, Natural History and American History all of which were excellent.

The Capital, Washington DC

Next day we called in on an Amish settlement at Lancaster en route to Philadelphia. We visited two farms and saw them harvesting maize for silage using mule drawn equipment which was both interesting and bizarre. In Philadelphia we stayed at the “Embassy Suite” where our three room accommodation was just like home!

Amish Maize harvesting

Our final tour took in the Liberty Bell, City Hall, Benjamin Franklin’s Printing works and Logan square before heading towards Newark airport and home. We managed about an hours sleep on the plane so now it is catch up time. All in all a very interesting tour but one requiring a certain amount of stamina to enjoy!

Love

Mike & Kate

8th September 2018

Dear All,

An early letter as we are off to the US of A tomorrow. Monday was a busy start to the week as we took Norman and Rosemary to catch a coach first thing. We then killed time having breakfast in Tescos before swimming, followed by the dentist for me while Kate travelled to Cambridge for some pre holiday shopping. I joined her in town and all before lunch! This was followed by the last planting of lettuce for the year and mending yet another bike puncture.

It was MOT and service day on Tuesday, this year, using the local Over Garage rather than Marshalls the Peugeot agent in Cambridge. Also on Tuesday Amélie restarted school and so far so good!

Back to School

On Wednesday we attended a dementia talk in Willingham Library given by one of our walking colleagues whose mother died from this condition in Belgium. In the evening Kate came with me to Little Paxton where I was delivering a Garden Club talk but beforehand we called on Pat Law whose husband John – my usual Moldova companion, has debunked to Turkey.

On Thursday we completed the sixth section of the Stour Valley Path from Stoke-by-Clare to Great Thurlow via Wixoe, Sturmer, Kedington and Great Wratting. We saw more of the river on this section and the sun shone nearly all morning. Later I had a post event wash up meeting for Over Produce Show with the usual 15 points on the agenda!

Stour at Stoke-by-Clare

Stour near Wixoe

Wixoe Mill burnt out

Kedington

Ford at Great Wratting

Kate has been to Addenbrookes to visit Rachel yesterday afternoon. She is improving with most of her tubes removed but has been sick a couple of times so they will not let her home until she can successfully eat a sandwich. Matthew’s father has arrived from South Africa to help.

Love

Mike & Kate

2^nd September 2018

Dear All,

The follow up to last week’s news that Rachel had been admitted to hospital in pain in the latter stages of pregnancy was that the baby was induced on Tuesday. Rachel then underwent a fairly serious operation to have part of her small intestine removed and is still in hospital. She has to remain there for at least a week and cannot lift anything for 6 weeks. This has created problems for them as most of their relatives are in South Africa. We had the 2.5 year old Grace staying for 3 nights. She is good in some ways in that she did not pine for her parents too much but she is extremely inquisitive and “No” means do it later when no one is looking! Meanwhile father Matthew has the baby (Arthur) at home and in charge of feeding.

Grace & Arthur

On Thursday a group of us missed walking and went to Chelmsford to watch Essex playing Hampshire. The sun shone most of the day which was extended because the previous day had been washed out and Essex had their best day for some time and subsequent won by an innings.

Chelmsford

Lawrie, Rob, Ian & Mike

Last night we were on Street Pastors and were accompanied by two observers, one of which was our neighbour Denis Whitfield. It was an unusual night in that it started fairly busy then was quieter later on. There were several people about as it was payday weekend, but generally good humoured. There were several extra rough sleepers so we had some interesting conversations!

It was the last cricket match of the season yesterday and Over 1sts won so finished 3^rd in their league. The 2nds struggled to raise a team most weeks and may well be discontinued – at one time we fielded 4 teams each Saturday. The football team also won and are joint top at present.

Mary-Ann and the children are now back in Hove so that Amélie can attend school and Andy is planning to commute at least until the end of the year.

We are off to the USA next weekend for two weeks visiting the East Coast Historical sites.

Love

Mike & Kate