FAMILY & FRIENDS

This will be a short blog as it was mainly a visiting family trip, not the kind of stuff anyone else want to read about.

We flew in over the Caucus Mountains – long time since we have seen snow.  I would love to visit a snowy area at some point and try to get some good pics, for now this from the plane.

Fantastic weather for the first part, unbelievable for the time of year but of course it changed back to normal for the first couple of days in Berkhamsted – very cold and windy. Normal spring weather.We started off staying in Cabin on the Lake in East Hoathly to visit family in Bexhill.  Lovely Wood Cabin in a great setting. Quite a few birds around, to us after Alice springs it was fantastic to be near water even if it was a bit coolish.

Down to coast, looking forward to being by the sea again, enjoyable if out of the wind. We spent another night in our wooden cabin.Than Oxford was our base for a few days, we always love wandering around the town and the surrounding countryside. Oxford is a really great city lots to do and see. Highly recommend the Pitt Museum, it has artefact’s from just about every country in the world, fantastic.  Had a great Indian meal in the part of Oxford where “Morse and Endeavour” TV series filmed.

The garden of my fathers house has lots of birds and squirrels, fantastic to watch.

A few days in Derbyshire, staying at the Premier Inn, Chesterfield. Walking and driving this area is lovely and the scenery is fantastic.   We did some amazing walks, the weather was amazing. It was one of the warmest Easters in UK and everyone seemed to be out and about enjoying a few days of Sunshine.

First time I had been to Peak District, never knew how pretty it was, lush green fields and streams every where .

Completely different from where we live in Alice Springs where rain is a special event.

 Chatsworth House is good for a visit – but being easter weekend and school holidays the house and grounds were packed, we kept to the outer grounds with lots of birdlife here. Great walk around the grounds, most people just seemed to park their cars,s et up and have a picnic which seemed odd to us.

Perfect pic for Easter Sunday.

We really enjoyed the few days in the Peak District, the spring flowers were out and the birds and wildlife abundant.  We were really pleased to find this tiny butterfly.

Other places we visited on the trip were Sapperton Tunnel the most ornate canal tunnel in UK – very interesting and scenic, We visited friends in Stroud for a long lunch again great weather, couldn’t believe our luck. Our friends said we must have brought the sunshine from Australia. Stroud is a lovely town we had not visited in the past.

Around our home town are Aldbury, Ashridge Common and Dockey Woods, great outdoor spaces for birds, deer, bluebells and walks.

We thought we would be too early for the Bluebells but amazingly they were early this year too so that was great,  I love the bluebells and trying to get good photos – not that I usually manage to.

There were plenty of deer around as well as squirrels and the birds were very active. The Deer are easy to see at this time of year as they are mating, otherwise really hard to see in the woods.

Went to the village of Albury which is a quaint old village used in Numerous movies and TV shows, The Vicar of Dibly , The Avengers( with Steed not Thor) and The Dirty Dozen to name a few.

On our last day we went to Kew Gardens, specifically to see an unusual display of glass sculptures by Dale Chihuly. 

Some were beautiful, some not so, but all were weirdly interesting. We always enjoy going to Kew Gardens, its best to avoid school holidays if you don’t like crowds.