Travelling Bead 2: Happy to be in England

And so to England. It’s been 3 years since I saw my brother and his family, who live in a marvellous old house on the edge of a field in Wye, Kent. Rape fields carpeted in yellow roll down the hills to the distant train lines. Mists fog up the chilly mornings and ice melts on the neighbours’ rooftops. Rabbits run amok in the clumps of wild daffodils, cyclamen and bluebells, under the gnarled century old mulberry tree. It is good to be with family. We’d brought them two bottles of Bohemian champagne from Prague, wrapped in our thermal socks, which the customs officials at Prague airport tried to confiscate, concerned it could be explosives. We'd tried the rose at the Beethoven, and it didn't taste that bad. I made a bit of a fuss about them taking our wedding champagne, so fortunately the officials took pity on me and gave them back to us at Gatwick. We opened them the first night at Steve and Kathy ... and Reno started to know his in-laws. With the problematic family that we had, it's no surprise that we had to get through both bottles. Good in a way because Reno finally had his astonishing, unbelievable stories substantiated. And so did Steve.

Traditionally I'm taken to Folkstone for a day of typically English fish and chips. As usual, it was cold and windy, and as usual the fish was fantastic. Steve drove us to Dover, to the white cliffs, overlooking the busy channel tunnel and ferry boats. As usual it was cold and windy ... colder than I remembered even Prague. But it was beautiful to be in the lush green countryside again, just at the beginning of spring.

Happy clams in Folkstone

Our hair had grown - inches ... we went to Canterbury where Steve and I had lived when our father had lived there, to a hairdresser of unknown repute. I froze on the doorstep when I saw the blue rinse women coming out on their walking frames, hairstyles like Margaret Thatchedroof and Bronwyn Bisskop. The salon still used those huge radioactive cones as hairdryers over their clients heads, and those not in curlers were having perms, or their hair in rollers. Suffice to say that all the growing out of layers I'd been persevering over a year for was snipped off ... and Reno had a grandpa haircut. We've been adding fertiliser ever since.

From Wye to Rye, we passed Wherethefokarwi ... an ethereal, end of the world, what's happened here place: windy like the back of beyond, stoney like some post apocalyptic, holocaust sort of place - Dungeen, which sells property for $500,000 for a wooden shack. Walking distance to the beach along stones, small cafe, miniature train line, haunt of recluses and artists ... and right underneath a nuclear reactor. The whole area hums and sparks and people come here to pull up beach chairs, sit on the stones, and face the road. And get radioactive. The stones seem to suck you into them ... astonishing that this is touted as great real estate.

Dover

I'm way way behind in my blogging, so instead will just post some photos .... and a quick mention that we went to London to see Sir Neville Mariner having his 90th birthday celebration concert, to the West End to see a fabulous Billy Elliott show, for a frighteningly expensive Indian meal and a day at the National Gallery. Time in Canterbury, time talking, time being with family. Fabulous.

Off to Paris.