Monday 21st December 09 Winter Solstice

Happy Solstice everyone!

An early start to prepare for a day when who knows what might happen?

I don't expect to write a blog for a few days. But I might surprise you!

Surprise!!!


Gill went into town on the bus first thing as she needed to get assorted presents, put a cheque in for me, post letters and I don't know what else... She got a Family Day Rover ticket as this would work out cheaper for us all when we went into town later.

I kept the stove going as it was bitterly cold outside and there are still lots of slices of pears drying, and I did absolutely loads of washing up so there's none hanging around whilst we're away.

I also got some packing done and Gill got back at 11, she packed and I made sandwiches for everybody, and we went to wait for the just-after-1pm bus... which was late as it was trapped in a huge traffic jam of mostly single occupancy cars heading into town.

But the bus came and we crawled into town and got to the station at 1.45, just after the hourly train had gone. So we waited for the 2.38, had our lunch and were soon on our way to Scarborough... a very pretty train journey. We were due to get in to Scar at 3.30 and the x93 to leave Northbound at 3.40, but that bus was late too, and we got very cold but eventually it came, and we were in Fylingthorpe by about 4.35, and easily found the house, called 'Burnside', that we've rented off our neighbour for a couple of days.

The heating was on, as our neighbours spent last night here, and the place is cosy and spacious, uncluttered and lovely. It'll be good to see it in the morning, in the daylight.

We had a simple pasta tea and I lit the 'Burnside' stove, which is a large Town and Country, I think. It had been cleaned out which makes it more difficult to light as woodstoves work best with a bed of ash under the logs. But I did get it to go, and we had a fun evening. We enjoyed the first Royal Institution Lecture, which was on how plants dealt with their animal 'opponents'. Later, when the children were in bed, I watched some of the Michael Jackson TV coverage.
I found that Robin Hood's Bay has an internet 'mesh' http://rhbmesh.net/ but I'll have to wait til tomorrow to see if I can connect...