Today I've mostly bin...

[Bunnylump]

The one we were in we most definitely noticed. We were walking down to the beach, when all of a sudden there was a noise which sounded as if there were hundreds of lorries simultaneously tipping boulders ALL around us. D and I looked at each other and he was all fuzzy - wobbling up and down. Part of the cliff collapsed and the tourist shop we were next to had ouzo pouring out of the doors and smashed china all over the place. It was very scary. Fortunately, all the buildings were earthquake proofed with steel reinforcement so none of the buildings came down.

Anyway, this is cool, I just realised I have a webcam!! Here is my new watch.

[tricia]

Very nice watch Bunny. Are you enjoying playing with your new lap top?

Today I have been editing my photos from Holland last year and making a photobook - nearly finished. Later I shall be glued to the telly watching the Rugby. It is bitter cold out and we have had snow all morning- It is not lying fortunately

Tricia

[strep98]

....sitting in the garden having lunch. I've heard it's snowing up north

[MBH]

Anyway, this is cool, I just realised I have a webcam!! Here is my new watch.

Nice colour watch - and nice extra feature on your laptop. Pity you managed to TOTALLY obscure your face in the picture. Quite by accident I'm sure

We went to Crete for our honeymoon..... earthquake that had happened during the night.

Honeymoon - earth moved - do you delight in making statements I don't dare answer or comment on in an open forum?

[Bunnylump]

I didn't want to BREAK the new webcam... I thought it might cope with the watch, but doubted if it would cope with the face, especially the morning after a night out... But the upside is that you can see my picture of Ghyllingvase Beach instead. Which is much prettier.

[LAT]

Honeymoon - earth moved - do you delight in making statements I don't dare answer or comment on in an open forum?

I thought I could rely on you to comment on that MBH!

Been travelling back from Munich today. Still no Internet at home so this is still being typed on the borrowed iPad. I have now given up trying to keep up on any forum threads other than this one, but will also reply to PMs whenever I can.

[tricia]

Had a slight panic this morning when I could not access the website - then I remembered Scurras announcement which I had saved in favourites! Trying to do Saturday Herald's cryptic crossword.

Tricia

[Bunnylump]

On Friday, we travelled the three hundred miles to Falmouth. Rather surprisingly this only took about 5 hours, even having joined the M25 at 8 30am. We went to David’s house, which is wonderfully located with a sea view. Being a lovely (albeit cold) day, we took a stroll down to the harbour. We had lunch at “The Shed”, which was very good, and even had a waiter honest enough to realise D’s mistake in reading the bill in Euros! We then had a walk down to Gyllingvase beach, and round the headland to Swanpool. We took a moment to look at the wildfowl on the lake and then walked back.
In the evening, we drove to Pandora Inn at Restrongruet Creek. This has a fabulous location, right on the waterside. However, the meal was disappointing (I paid £18 for sea bass fillet – which was actually HALF a seabass fillet, one piece of potato and three spears of asparagus!!). The owner was strange and not very welcoming. Not to be recommended.
The following day, we said our goodbyes and drove to Lydford Gorge, on the west of Dartmoor. This is a National Trust site, and is really worth a visit. It is a lush oak-wooded steep-sided river gorge. There is a three mile, circular walk, which encompasses the White Lady Falls http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:White ... dGorge.jpg
and the amazing “Devil’s Cauldron”, which you can walk right inside, to watch the water crashing around and scouring out the giant cauldron. The noise is tremendous. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File: ... 238404.jpg
Next, on to The Blue Ball Inn at Countisbury near Lynton. My cousin (who lives at Blackmoor Gate) had organised this get together. There were 17 of us, and we all had a great meal and far too much to drink. Everyone stayed the night (clean rooms, comfortable beds, ensuite). It was ages since I’d caught up with the family (and met some new additions too). I discovered that my other cousin has started up now as a mobile mechanic, and is also “servicing dinosaurs” at the Combe Martin dinosaur park(!), that my cousin’s son is just about to go and paint the OUTSIDE of an offshore lighthouse (in Anglesea), and that my cousin’s wife is starting up a business making wedding tiaras.
It was hysterically funny seeing my cousin Caroline, who is as mad as a hatter (e.g. she thinks that they way to solve problems in Libya is to introduce “nice cups of tea” and if that didn’t solve it then “a rich tea, or in extreme cases, a jammy dodger”.)
The following day we had a really lovely walk around “Wind Hill”, which took us onto a ridge and up on to Beacon Tor. En route we walked past some fabulous hanging woodland (sessile oak and white beam), which was still leafless but glistened in the bright sunshine and looked totally surreal. The walk encompassed breathtaking views across the Lyn Valley, where you could hear the skylarks singing, and watch buzzards gliding from above, and hear their plaintive mews. The smell of coconut from the bright yellow gorse was strong. From the beacon, we could see not only both Lynton (perched up on top of the cliff) and Lynmouth (down by the sea) but it also afforded fabulous views down to the glistening sea the other side, and eventually down to the rocks and beaches hundreds of feet below.
To finish off, we went up to Caroline’s house (right up on the side of a hill in Exmoor), and she made us a Devonshire Cream tea.
Anyway, all in all a great weekend.

[LAT]

it all sounds wonderful.

we've been going in the opposite direction as today we drove down to Cornwall. And hey! the hotel has internet so I am now trying to play catch up on here.

[giraffe]

Sounds great! I bet you're shattered though.

This afternoon we went to a concert by an orchestra that K is in. I've not really heard her play in a full orchestra as her usual one is a wind orchestra. It was all film and stage tunes, so quite light and entertaining. It was in the Severn Theatre which is right on the banks of the river in Shrewsbury, overlooking the Welsh Bridge. The theatre was only built a couple of years ago and the seats are really comfortable, we were in the back row (by choice as I had sat there before) which is only 13 rows back, plenty of legroom (essential with my knees, I'm often in agony at theatres if I have to have my feet tucked in under the seat) and my Mum was raving about how wonderful the loos were!

[eirian]

Bunny, that sounds absolutely perfect weekend!
And I'll definitely agree that Lydford gorge is worth a visit - love the place.

We had a day of contrasts yesterday. One very happy boy followed by a very upset little boy.
Last summer, we bought a small blue ball that Thomas loved. Unfortunately it got left a little too close to the fire at some point last winter and became a slightly smaller and unevenly shaped ball... Well, we called in at tesco to get a larger ball to play with at the park, only to find the exact same blue ball back in stock, so we got 2 while we were there. Thomas was in heaven - not only had he got his favourite ball back, but he'd got an extra large ball as well (his expression reminded us of Pippin in Lord of the Rings where he says 'it comes in PINTS' when visiting the human pub). Wish I'd managed to get a pic of him carrying the big ball by picking it up with the two smaller balls which were held tightly, one in each hand.
Unfortunately, later that afternoon he decided it would be a good idea to hit one of our cats with a toy, so he got stern 'no's off both of us, and got introduced to his 'naughty chair', something we had hoped not to have to do until after he was 2.
Today we took Thomas to his Grandad's model railway club's exhibition. There's a good chance his grandad will use Thomas as an excuse to build lots of model railways over the next few years!

[Bunnylump]

Excellent! (Does he NEED an excuse?? )I love the anagogy with Pippin: I know just what you mean!!
It's horrible when you have to punish them, but of course you must.

And Giraffe, I'm totally with you on the leg room / knee thing. That makes all the difference for enjoying your concert or not, doesn't it? Still, it sounds like you had a good time. I've only visited Shrewsbury once, we went there for my Mum's birthday. She liked the Brother Cadfael stories -and we all went to visit the Brother Cadfael thing near the Abbey. And I made her a birthday cake with a monastery herb garden iced on the top!! Nice town, isn't it?

EDIT
And if I'd seen you going the opposite way I would have waved, LAT! Hope you have a lovely time.

[giraffe]

It's a lovely town, except when the orchestra does a concert in a town centre church on a Saturday in December. If you take a wrong turn in the one way system it can take you 15 minutes and 10 miles to get back to where you were! With only two bridges across the river, narrow one way streets and Christmas shoppers all over the place it's a nightmare! Fortunately on a damp Sunday in March it was no problem.

[Wulfruna]

Nice to hear of all these folk heading to the South West for short breaks! Now you know why we chose to come and live down here And the weekend was particularly lovely and sunny - the air is so wonderfully bright and clear in the springtime. Though for some reason it has suddenly turned to a heavy mist today! I'm just watching the weather forecast and they are promising the sunshine again for tomorrow however, so LAT should get the benefit!

[LAT]

well today we went to The Lost Gardens of Heligan. It was lovely there, there is so much to see even at this time of year. It's an amazing place. And this evening we ate at Jamie Oliver's Fifteen Cornwall which was great. Tomorrow morning we plan to visit Trelissick so I am hoping it is dry and bright. It's a bit murky here this evening.

[giraffe]

I'm off to get the car MOTed wish me luck!

I might need it after 3 power cuts, problem with the burglar alarm and a malfunctioning clarinet in the last 12 hours!


edit: It passed! And I wasn't charged for the clarinet repair.

[Bunnylump]

There must be something in the air, my central heating was in bits again yesterday. It probably doesn't help that the boiler is now 25 years old and you can't get bits for it any more. Rather alarmingly, I spotted D chopping up bits of plastic off a paint lid to fix something... Oh, and the car, which previously had something rattling STOPPED rattling. Which is always a bit of a worry...

And yes, folks, this is me, HAVING A LUNCH BREAK. My work to rule is starting to bite in a big way...

[Laura]

Today, I've been likened to Miranda Hart again.

Not sure whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. If I knew that they were refering to the lovely, intelligent award-winning comedienne, writer, actress and generally very-nice-seeming person, then I'd be very flattered. However, I suspect the similarities lie with the chaotic, hopeless, socially-inept character that she plays in the sitcom. Not sure that's a good thing to be compared to.

[Bunnylump]

Ah, surely it must be the lovely, funny version!!

I usually get likened to (looks wise) the actress Julie Graham. I can't really see it myself... I don't think anyone's ever found someone who's like me personality wise. Probably a good thing...

Today I've mostly bin...
being given ANOTHER bottle of wine at work (as a thank you) - very nice, but I'm getting a bit concerned. It's the SECOND one this week...do you think they know something about me???

[Redfraggle]

Yes i reckon they do Bunny!