Wednesday Morning

. . . and another warm, sunny day too.  We have been so lucky with the weather this far.  It's been like the first time be came here when it was similar, although even then we had a wet day, I seem to remember.  Since then it's been less than summery.  But this year - wow!  No complaints.  And one of the nice things about living/sleeping under thatch is that it is cool at night.  There's not been one night when I wished for my bedroom fan, not even over the weekend when the days were scorching.

The one blip has been the lack of a reliable (or, at times, any) internet connection, not only because of my blogging and networking and modding but also because we rather use the laptops instead of maps, etc.  But we can't fault the staff - they've been working very hard on it since we reported it and things now seem to be in order again.  Fingers crossed.

On Friday we escaped a Chelmsford that was gearing up for three big events - the V Festival at Hylands, a huge international Scout Jamboree and a 'march' that was threatening to become confrontational.  Now I have no idea what happened with the march, as we haven't watched much telly, I gather from the paper that the V was successful and as for the scouts - I guess they are jollying along, enjoying the fine weather as much as we are.

As we trundled down the A12 to the M25, the V traffic was building up, almost all the way back to the motorway.  Over the last few years we have found ourselves heading home on the same day as the start of V and a right pain it has been too,but this year we missed it.  The traffic on the M25 was light, no tailbacks at the tunnel, thank goodness (and another first) and it wasn't till we got to Tunbridge Wells that the first hold up occurred.  Over the years we have worked out a few little short cuts, you see, and as we got to the first one we saw that it was blocked off.  Great!  Fortunately, by following our noses, we managed to get back onto the road we wanted and bowled merrity along.  However, it must be the week for blocking off roads that Clarks' needed because the road to Rotherfield was also blocked off.  The diversion signs were more helpful this time and we got there.  After that is was a quick shop and then on to the farm whee we had a picnic and our first swim, while they finished off the Barn for us.  I hasten to add, this was by arrangement - we didn't just turn up early hoping it was OK.

I gather that all is well back home too.  Thanks, S.

The Barn from the back



A view from the back of the Barn