11th April 2010

11th April 2010.

Dear All,

Kate and I spent most of yesterday at a wedding – Jo Colquhoun for those that know her, daughter of friends from Cottenham for those that don’t. It was a very grand affair with the reception for 140 in a marquee in the parent’s garden. It went very well but as often is the case it seemed to go on for ever so that we did not finish the meal until 9 pm – then there was the evening rave up. The weather was brilliant and the food and flowers probably cost a fortune.

Duncan, Sue, Mike, Jo & Mr & Mrs Newman Snr.


Cottenham Church

This week’s garden club talk was at Henham near Stanstead with added excitement of the beamer cutting out half way through!.
I decided to do the shorter walk on Thursday as I had an evening meeting; however it turned out to be 10.2 miles as opposed to 10.6 miles for the longer walk! We started at Sturmer near Haverhill and again the weather added to the enjoyment of the day.

Kedington Church

I collected the heavy roller from its winter quarters on a farm and started the cricket wicket preparation on Friday. It does not seem too bad at this stage.
Otherwise it has been digging, planting, sowing, hoeing and grass cutting – things are really starting to move.

Love

Mike & Kate

4th April 2010

4th April 2010.

Dear All,

Happy Easter to all readers! We started with a sunrise service at 6.30 am and the sun did rise after an initial delay at about 6.50 am. The temperature was 3°C so not a morning for hanging around. This was followed by an 11.00 am Family service and with Communion and evening service to come it is reminiscent of the never ending Good Fridays at Upminster!

Sunrise 6.50 am

I have given two talks on "Hand in Hand" and Ecuador this week, one to the after church gathering last Sunday and another to the Women’s meeting where only one person fell asleep – practically a record!
Monday evening Kate and I joined some of the U3A walkers for a Thai meal at the Barley Mow in Histon and on Thursday Kate was not working, and joined the walk starting at Preston near Hitchin. It was one of the more scenic routes and will look even better in a month when the bluebells are out.

Preston Almshouses

Approaching Preston

Mary-Ann has been offered a permanent job at Millers, one of the places she has temped. They are architech/designers/engineers and have been trying for Olympic projects.
Otherwise it has mostly been gardening and mending a rabbit’s hutch for Esther to collect.

Love

Mike & Kate

28th March 2010.

Dear All,

We spent the day with Esther yesterday catching up on a few jobs and listening to her sing Handel’s Messiah with Havering Singers in St Peter’s church, Harold Wood.

Havering Singers warming up

Mary-Ann joined us in the afternoon and she should have met up with Andy who has been travelling in Spain, France and Holland last week. The jobs included removing a box round pipes, mending guttering, cutting the grass, planting apple trees and pruning raspberries.

In the afternoon Esther had to practice with the musicians and soloists so Kate and I went to Hyde Hall, the RHS garden near Chelmsford. It was very neat and orderly and showing quite a lot of colour for the time of year.

Hyde Hall Pond

Hyde Hall Winter Border

I have caught up with the garden by planting maincrop spuds and some late shallots but mainly sowing has been under glass. We appear to have another water leak from the mains as a small bog has formed near the rhubarb. The Water Company came to check and think they have located yet another leak in the road. This makes about 12 in the last 5 years.
I went to Thornhaugh near Peterborough on Saturday to talk to an organic vegetable box scheme company who want some help with trialling. They quickly expanded up to 9,000 boxes delivered a week but the recession has seen this contract back to 6,200.
Our walk on Thursday started at Quendon near Saffron Walden and circled round Berden and Rickling, just over 11 miles. Addenbrookes put me on some new medication for rheumatism and so far they are not helping as I felt dreadful after the walk and have had four migraines!

Extra Pictures from Costa Rica from colleague with telescopic lens

Love

Mike & Kate

21st March 2010

21st March 2010.

Dear All,

We seem to be back in routine after an exciting month away. The new premises in Ecuador are much nicer than the old so it did not seem so bad abandoning all the work we did before. Dave and Ana have a 3 story house plus basement with two separate bungalows which have been turned into classrooms. In addition, there are other outhouses in various states of repair, one of which houses the “Latin Link” dentist. The garden currently includes five large avocado trees, several citrus bushes as well as figs, custard apples and peach trees. Humming birds visited daily and condors circled above doubtless waiting for a “gringo” to collapse.

Mano e Mano

Our initial charge was to build a sort of grandstand to shelter parents when they have open and community days. This would have been taxing without metal work but we spent a day planning and quantity surveying before they changed their minds and we turned our attention to building a classroom on the site of a damp rubbish dump and making an adjoining building waterproof. The tasks also included digging a soak away, repairing leaking roofs and rewiring areas with dodgy electrics. In addition, John and Jen were temporarily seconded to the nearby catholic school to install electricity in their classrooms. I was mainly in charge of the cement mixer and this is quite good for the figure at that altitude and in those temperatures.

Initial site

Nearly completed

I had been asked to take out some vegetable seeds and was happy to establish a vegetable garden. Radish emerged in four days and French beans in a week! A first for me was planting a banana tree.
If it is any consolation for those of you who were feeling the cold, insect activity was intense and both Jen and Jean-Claude were bitten so badly that they needed medical attention. Also we spent quite a lot of time being wet, not just from sweat but we arrived during carnival and a quaint tradition is to squirt folk with shaving soap and then empty buckets of water over them. In addition, the culmination of the children’s holiday clubs was a quiz where correct answers were rewarded with the opportunity of throwing water over an Englishman.
Costa Rica was very exciting, after meeting up in the capital San Jose (including Kate flying out from a freezing UK) we spent a day there before we travelled to five other sites in contrasting regions. There were 11 in our group representing Canada, USA, South Africa, Germany and 6 from the UK. Our guide Alan was only 21 but excellent. We used public transport mostly which was a challenge as it was usually crowded. First stop was Tortuguero on the Caribbean coast, which necessitated a boat ride as there were no roads. This area is famous for turtles laying their eggs on the beach (but later in the year). We arose at 5 am and took canoes round the nearby jungle and were spoilt by seeing so much wildlife during the first trip: howler monkeys, sloths, otters, river turtles, caymen, iguanas, lizards and a host of birds.

Cayman

The temperature was well over 30°C so Dave and I swam in the sea for 30 minutes before were advised to get out as someone had been attacked by a shark. We visited the turtle research centre and took a jungle walk before moving on the second site Sarapiqui in the rain forest. We stayed at a site run by a hunter turned conservationist called Alex and he was quite a character. The rain forest lived up to its named and it did not stop for 3 days – they get 240” a year! Again we explored the jungle this time via aerial walk ways but actually saw more at the living quarters as Alex fed birds and there was a constant stream.
After the rain forest we moved onto the cloud forest at La Fortuna – less rain but higher and mainly cloud covered. There is an active volcano Arenal nearby and although we climbed some way up it the skies did not clear to see the summit but we could hear it rumbling away. Dave went horse riding and we spent a happy evening in a large thermal spring site. The wild life count was mounting with spider monkeys, toucans, snakes, insects, coati, kinkajou etc.

Iguana

Next stop was Monteverde higher in the cloud forest with even more wild life. This time we had a night walk in the jungle and were able to see much more. In the town were a butterfly farm, frog pond, orchid garden, serpentarium and insect collect just to fill in the flora and fauna we had not already seen.

Friendly Tarantula during night walk

Onwards to the Pacific coast at Quebos and the temperature rose to well over 35°C. The sand was too hot to stand on and the sea like bathwater. We explored the mangrove swamps by boat then returned to San Jose.


Kate with scorpion

The Pacific Coast

I have a few photos which I will lodge somewhere this is a brief outline of our travels.
Thanks to all who remembered my birthday.


Love

Mike & Kate

7th February 2010

7th February 2010.

Dear All,

The second week of jury service was not as exciting as the first as we were not called into action. It started by being given Monday off, Tuesday we were summoned for 1.45 pm and sat there all afternoon waiting for a court to become vacant but this did not happen. We were then asked to phone in on Wednesday and were told that we were not needed again – relief all round.
I visited John MacLeod on Monday, a previous director of NIAB now paralysed from the waist down due to prostate cancer secondaries. He is incredibly positive and still attends RHS, NIAB and Sugar Beet research meetings in a wheel chair. They have just named the new glasshouse block at NIAB after him.
We had a Mold-Ag planning meeting in the “Travellers Rest” at lunch time and 3 or 4 of us plan to return to Moldova towards the end of April.
I did a garden club talk in Saffron Walden on Tuesday night, no two clubs are the same and this was quite a posh one with about 40 folk meeting in the wood panelled rooms of the Bowls Club.
On Wednesday John Law came and helped me sort out our computer again. We had to transfer all our files to the external hard drive and re load Windows – not a quick job, but so far seems to have worked.
I have had three walks this week, twice round Over Fen in bright sunshine (once with Kate) and the U3A walk starting at Toppesfield near Great Yeldham. This was a slog as it was very sticky mud and hard going. 10.1 miles but seemed like much further!




Over Fen 1


Over Fen 2

Toppesfield The Green Man

Kate was off on Friday so we visited the giant Huntingdon Garden centre at Houghton to stock up on seed potatoes, seeds for Ecuador and a few items for the South American, Costa Rica adventure.
Ray Asplin is taking over one of the allotments at the cemetery and I spent yesterday morning trying to rescue the raspberry, gooseberry and currant bushes that are already there. I watched Over 2 v 0 Ely City Res. in freezing fog in the afternoon.
We catch the plane for Ecuador early on Monday 15th so I plan to spend the night in a hotel at Gatwick on Sunday. This may or may not be the last bulletin for some time!
Love

Mike & Kate

31st January 2010

31st January 2010.

Dear All,

It has been an interesting week in Lake Wobegone! – mainly because it was the first week of my jury duty at Cambridge Crown Court. It was certainly an eye opener and although it was not riveting all through – it had its moments.

Cambridge Crown Court

The first day was worst as you have to arrive early and then sit and wait. One jury was selected at 12 noon but we were not called until 3.00 pm having arrived at 9.30 am. Our case took all week so did not finish until Friday afternoon. A Geordie gentleman had beaten another guy up, trashed his car followed him home, beaten him with a baseball bat, broken his arm, stolen goods, marched him to the ATM and made him withdraw cash. When the ambulance came they brought police with them and made the victim tell them who had done it. The attackers brother later phoned the victim from Newcastle to threaten him to change his evidence “because I am a hundred times worse than my brother”. The victim seemed far from upright and honest himself with suggestions of handling stolen goods and it was largely a case of who was lying the least. There were 7 charges in total, 6 against the attacker and 1 against the brother. The attacker admitted the first two as there were witnesses so it was a matter of deliberating the others. In the jury room only two of us initially wanted guilty on all counts – but just like “12 Angry Men” we eventually persuaded the rest.
I think we were right as it turned out the attacker had a dozen previous convictions for burglary and assault while his brother had 52 previous convictions!
Otherwise we held a cemetery trustees meeting on Wednesday and put up the cost of a plot once again – I don’t think we can afford to die now! No connection but I had a MRI scan on my ankle at the Lea hospital yesterday.
Today Malcolm McKinnon is back in town taking the morning service and this evening we have a Recommisioning Service for the work of CEEM in Moldova. Kate is not only feeding Malcolm and 4 others but providing a tea for the CEEM group. They have been having their coldest winter for ages in Moldova with temperatures down to -24°C. Fuel and wood prices have soared and at least one old man in Burlacu has frozen to death.

Snow in Moldova

Love

Mike & Kate

24th January 2010

24th January 2010.

Dear All,

In years to come the quiz question will be “Which book begins with the words “’I was flossing my teeth on Sunday night when the floss stuck and I yanked it hard – I will hear the sound of the large tooth fragment pinging off the mirror for many days to come”’ Yes another trip to the dentist this week – it is becoming a habit that I am keen to kick!
Our course on College Gardens has been suspended for a month due to the inclement weather which seems a bit of an over reaction so more time available this week. I managed to dig some garden on Monday and it was not as wet as I expected. Bird life has been very active in the garden and this green woodpecker came within a couple of metres of the back door.

Green Woodpecker

We had an Events Planning meeting on Monday night so I have been following up various leads since and have booked a tour of Wolfson College Gardens and the RSPB tour of Fen Drayton Pits so far together with Stuart Wood the chaplain to Cambridge Utd.
While it has been too wet to garden or tour college gardens I have been straightening the garage workshop – not too exciting but needed doing otherwise how would I know that I have more than 50 different sizes of nails and screws?
Our walk this week began at Saxon Street near Newmarket and proceeded via Wooditton and Borough Green including a section of Devil’s Dyke.


Devil’s Dyke

One of our former neighbours Lynne Medlock came for dinner on Friday and my computer man came to try a sort my machine. It had been infected by a fiendish piece of “spyware” which copies the Windows security shield. The pop-up is identical except for having “Windows” on the strap line. It tells you there are various problems which you need to deal with and if you do you downloads things which gradually bind your machine up. It took Keith over an hour to find the problem and even now it is not perfect.
Yesterday Kate and I took a trip to Oundle, which is a stone built town similar to the Cotswolds, but in Northamptonshire. Although it is dominated by the school there are numerous interesting buildings. We followed the town trail and stayed for lunch.


Oundle School Bookshop

Oundle War Memorial

In the evening we were guests at the Over Day Centre Volunteers Christmas lunch by dint of having done a fund raising quiz last autumn. The meal was very good and two ladies sitting at out table who did not know each other found out that their brothers had been best men at each others weddings.
Ben has moved into his new flat address: 39 Gleneldon Road, Streatham, London, SW16 ?? (don’t know the rest of the post code yet).

Love

Mike & Kate