14^th August 2016

Dear All,

It has been a busy end of the week with walking Thursday, Test Match Friday, Over Show and Street Pastors Saturday, Baby Dedication and lunch out today and Wisley tomorrow.

On Tuesday evening we attended “Shakespeare in the open air” at Trinity College, we saw “Comedy of Errors” which was very good, but it was the chilliest evening of the week.

Trinity Garden

Our Thursday walk started at Little Downham, near Ely, and took in a slice of the Fens. Crops seemed later there than many other places with combining only just beginning.

Near Coveney

The temperature was much hotter at the Oval on Friday, Ben got me a ticket and we were sitting in the full sun all day watching Pakistan’s relentless progress. I left just before the main excitement of taking 2 wickets at the end of the day! It was good to catch up with Ben who is currently having work done in his flat and writing a CV to reapply for an upgrading of his job at King’s.

The Oval

Iconic Gas Holder

Over Show was of a high standard but dominated by one youth who is so good it is discouraging the opposition. Kate was also judging the children’s entries which were rather sparse.

Over Show

Both Over cricket and football teams were at home – the footballers won narrowly and the cricketers lost narrowly.

Street Pastors was fairly lively late on, at one stage Kate and Peter were trying to revive a youth comatose in a gateway, Liz and I were trying to sort a domestic situation, there was a fight going on in the main street which eventually needed an ambulance and we had just encountered the dreaded Neil Carpenter who had just been released from 16 weeks in jail for attacking a SP! He has an ASBO not to come to Cambridge centre if he is drunk, which he clearly was. However the police were thin on the ground due to holidays and other commitments, so I guess he slipped the net.

Kate & Gordon’s granddaughter Ruhe was dedicated in this morning’s service and several of us were invited to Lunch at Haddenham to celebrate.

Love

Mike & Kate

7^th August 2016

Dear All,

It was the annual chapel jaunt to Hunstanton yesterday and one of those rare days when it was almost too hot at the English seaside! We hired the Day Centre minibus which seats 17 and altogether there were 29 of us. We had also hired a room in the Tourist Information Centre for coffee and chip eating. There was plenty of beach exposed as high tide was 8.15 am and I managed a swim by wading out quite a distance. On the way back we were invited for a BBQ at Haddenham courtesy of Kate & Gordon.

Hunstanton Greensward

Serious Chip Consumption

Pitch ‘n Putt Competition

Low Tide

BBQ at Haddenham

Earlier in the week Natasha was with us until Tuesday lunchtime then progressed to Esther’s and Hove. I think they were amongst the first to try the new Brighton Tower which opened this week. While here we went swimming, travelled the guided bus to St Ives market, helped harvest my potatoes, attended the cinema and went shopping in Cambridge with Kate.

Kate & Natasha

Chris and Cathy Wright called on Monday. Cathy runs the Food Bank in Ely and Chris is now based in Basle working on Health & Safety for Syngenta. They have to decide where they will be based with three teenage children to consider.

Our Thursday walk was round Ickworth Park – over 10 miles in all but with plenty of shade on a hot day.

Ickworth Park

Wild Flower Meadow

On Friday I went to Colchester with three others to watch Essex v Sussex. It is a great setting for cricket and a large crowd on a sunny day.

Love

Mike & Kate

31st July 2016

Dear All,

We have greatly enjoyed entertaining Mary-Ann, Amélie and Albert until Friday, Andy having flown to Dublin on Sunday. They have visited St Ives, Milton Country Park and Ely but seemed to enjoy feeding the ducks in the river, helping harvest vegetables and playing on the Green just as much.  Amélie is quite tall for her age and Albert good natured and blessed with a healthy appetite.

Duck feeding at Overcote

Amélie & Ely Cathedral

Bert watching duck feeding

Ely Maltings

Unfortunately I had to be out two days on RHS business. It was Wisley on Monday judging 42 beetroot entries and checking progress of Sweet Corn and Sweet Pepper trials. On Wednesday it was judging the summer cabbage at Spalding, this time with the Panel. As I am chairman this year I could not back out. The journeys to both venues were not too bad – school holidays make a lot of difference and Wisley have some attractive ornamental trials in the same field this year including Agapanthus and Zantedeschia (coloured arum lilies).

Wisley Beetroot trial

Wisley New Varieties trial

I travelled down with Colin Randal from Thompson & Morgan Seeds and he needed to call in on Tozers Seeds at Cobham after to pick up some of their new kale plants for their press open day.

Vegetables have benefited from the wet June so we are harvesting runner beans, French beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce and courgettes a plenty and this week pulled the spring planted onions.

Both cricket teams won yesterday – a rare occurrence this year!

Love

Mike & Kate

24th July 2016

Dear All,

Mary-Ann, Andy, Amélie and Albert arrived late Friday evening. Andy has to go to Dublin later today and the rest are staying until Friday. Yesterday I was judging Linton Show and I met up with the others at Linton Zoo. The show was reasonable quality, especially the fruit but the vegetable entries were less than usual.

The zoo was very hot and the lions and tigers wisely chose to sleep, but the giant tortoises in which they specialise, were perhaps a bit more active than usual!

Linton Show

Winning Exhibit (Red currants)

Amelie & Postman Pat

Three cricket matches on the Green this week so a bit of preparation after the Carnival last weekend. The chapel team have had a reduced season due to opposition backing out but we has a match v Huntingdon District Council on Wednesday. Just as we arrived the heavens opened with a tremendous downpour including a carpet of hailstones. As it has been so dry beforehand it soon drained away and we were able to play. We needed 4 runs off the last two balls and our batsman managed to miss them both!

I had to go to Spalding again on Wednesday to record the RHS cabbage trial and on Tuesday Merv and I finished strimming the church graveyard.

Our Thursday walking outing started at Chrishall and took in Elmdon and Strethall. The designated leader, Peter McGill, had reccied the previous week but for some reason set out in the wrong direction and to quote him “did not step on one yard that he had reccied”. Consequently a short 7.5 miles ended up as 9.9 miles with an unhealthy percentage on roads. I think he will be delisted as a leader!

North of Elmdon

I had a Garden Club talk at Offord in the evening. Walking and cricket pitch repairing are not ideal preparation on a warm muggy evening, but luckily they were a friendly crowd.

I have had to build mesh screens for both greenhouses as we have a set of blackbirds in the garden that have taken a shine to the tomatoes as they ripen.

Kate has been busy collecting provisions for the Ely Food Bank recently as for the first time they have run out of goods.

Love

Mike & Kate

17th July 2016

Dear All,

It was Over Carnival day yesterday and we have just returned from picking up the post celebration litter. The sun shone so that always helps with this event. The parade was led by a pack of Harley Davidson motor bikes this year (deliberately!), we had the usual chapel stand but this year were granted one of the carnival tents which was bigger and stronger than our usual gazebo. We had lego and colouring (free), a countries quiz and a game both 10p each, so we were easily the best value on site! Kate shared the tea stand with the WI which was an experience in itself!

Harley Parade

Chapel tent

Alternative entertainment

Litter pickers

I had to go to Spalding on Tuesday to record a RHS cabbage trial. Unfortunately it has suffered from flooding, hail and pigeons so is not as good as last year’s cauliflowers.

Summer cabbage trial

I started strimming round the graves in the cemetery on Wednesday, we have the grass cut by a contractor but several of the graves are long since neglected so need an annual trim.

Our weekly walk started at Wrestlingworth, near Biggleswade and took in Eyeworth and Tadlow. It was warm and humid so plenty of sweating.

Wrestlingworth, The Chequers

Break in Tadlow graveyard

Only the one attempted murder in our street this week so quite dull really!

Love

Mike & Kate

10th July 2016

Dear All,

Kate and I met up with Esther at Hampden Court Flower Show on Wednesday. I had four free tickets from RHS as they messed up Chelsea tickets. Pat Howard also came with us. It is not the easiest venue to get to as the year we drove there was a huge traffic jam and the train journey involves several changes, but unlike Chelsea you can always find space once you arrive. The weather was hot and the gardens interesting, but the star item was probably the Floral Marquee which is huge with displays of every kind of flower and foliage. We sat in on a couple of talks by Christine Walkden and Alys Fowler which were more useful for the rest they provided than their content. The “Concept Gardens” were mostly strange and if I was expecting to see vegetables then I would have been disappointed!

  

On Thursday the walk was also in good weather starting at Ardeley which is well off the beaten track below Buntingford, reached by some rather narrow lanes. The walk included a long stretch of Roman road and several shaded lanes. In the evening one of the walkers (Ian Gordon who you may have met at my 70^th) had a spare ticket for the ladies cricket T20 International v Pakistan at Chelmsford. It was very enjoyable, if a bit one sided as England were much bigger, stronger and fitter. The standard of fielding was fantastic – perhaps because I have been used to Over’s efforts!

Ardeley Village Green

On Saturday we held our first “Lego Event” at the chapel. The Kingfisher church that John Law attends have been staging these for a year or so and lent us a vast pile of bricks, wheels etc. and Kate was in charge of bacon rolls. The attendance was moderate but it was a start and it will be punted at the Carnival next Saturday.

It was Street Pastor duty again last night. Kate was in Nightlite and I was on patrol. The atmosphere was fairly merry from the start as there is a 3 day fair on Parkers Piece and some had been indulging long term. The stand out incident arose when the security folk from Revolution, the next door night club delivered a scantily clad young girl to Nightlite, that they had found collapsed in the toilets. She had no documents, money or phone. They eventually extracted her name and found out that she was Polish and had just flown in from the USA.

The new security guy at Nightlite is Czech and very resourceful. He looked her up on Facebook and got a list and photos of her friends, lo and behold he then recognised one of them walking down the street!

His day job is security at Waitrose and had been entertaining the cafe staff with stories of the lengths some people go to steal and shop lift from the store – Kate now knows all the wrinkles!

Amélie was 5 on Tuesday and was blessed by the teachers going on strike so she had the day off school. I guess she will expect this every year just as she believes there is always a Carnival on Over Green – at least when she visits!

Love

Mike & Kate

3^rd July 2016

Dear All,

Kate and I were at Hutton on Tuesday to do a few jobs for Esther. It is amazing how much you can fit in a day if you try as we cut the grass, trimmed the hedge, tidied the greenhouse, weeded the front garden and a couple of back borders, laid a few paving slabs, weeded a couple of raised beds, cemented loose bricks on the front wall, cleaned and tried to fix a leaking gutter. Esther was at work all day so we did not actually meet up. She had entertained Mary-Ann, Amélie and Albert at the weekend as Andy participated in the London to Brighton 100 Km walk finishing joint 1^st and raising a decent sum for charity.

In the evening we went to Warboys for a talk by Dan Strange, deputy of Oak Hall about “Christianity and Culture” which was very good.

 On Wednesday it was wet nearly all day as opposed to the usual tropical evening downpour! Preparing cricket pitches has been a challenge but somehow we got through June without cancelling a Saturday match. Both Over teams are having moderate seasons – I think we should be looking for an Icelandic manager!

The Thursday walk started at Cowlinge in Suffolk south of Newmarket. It was dry overhead but there was plenty of moisture around.

Near Cowlinge

Ford at Wickhambrook

 Bee orchid

Plenty of gardening this week including harvesting overwintered onions and planting spring heading cauliflowers. Raspberries, cherries and red currants are all beginning to crop, especially the currants, Kate picked two tubs full without making any impression.

Autumn Onions

We had an interesting speaker at Men’s breakfast yesterday called Jonathan Gibson. He grew up in Huddersfield in a poor neighbourhood with a shared outdoor privie 60 yards down the road. He got into banking then retrained as a scientist and worked for Anglian Water developing microorganisms to treat toxic substances in sewage, then when AW changed direction invested his pay off into a kitchen fitting business.

Ben is safely back from Fiji and Venuatu, he seems to have had a good time but we haven’t heard too many details yet.

Love

Mike & Kate