The Cosses have landed!

After a pretty good flight (it helped that I took a whole Ativan – not a half as I usually do!) we arrived safe and sound at Heathrow where Beckie met us and drove us to her home in Gayhurst. Heathrow was looking pretty good actually – they’ve done a fair bit of modernizing and it was cleaner than we remember. We also discovered at the immigration point that if Phil had been travelling on his British passport, we could have gone through the MUCH shorter EU line even though I am travelling on a Canadian passport. Next time I’ll make sure I use his Brit passport when I’m booking the flights.

After leaving Heathrow, our introduction to British highway traffic was M4 to M25 to M1. The M25 and M1 are arguably the busiest highways in Europe. Even midday it was busy – it must be insane during rush hour. Lee (Beckie’s husband) is in Edinburgh on business at the moment. He left the house 2 hours before his flight out of Luton, which is only 25 miles away, but got caught in traffic and missed his flight!!

 Driving up to Gayhurst House is truly impressive! A long drive (half a mile) across several cattle grids as the sheep roam free, and there stands the stately home. Beckie’s apartment is one of 2 that makes up the top floor of the manor. It is 3 bathrooms, 3 bedrooms, huge dining room and living room. She has about 2000 sq ft which is huge in Britain. No elevator of course and the entrance is the usual grand open room with the stairs off to one side. I can only imagine how grand it was when it was still a single family home! It has huge leaded glass windows set in cement casements that look out over 3 small lakes for fishing and huge fields littered with sheep and frolicking lambs. They are very sweet and the thought of them on my dinner plate is a little off-putting but I’ll force myself to order them at the first opportunity.

 As we had landed about noon, we struggled to stay awake and with only a few nodding off naps in the middle of sentences, we stayed up until just after 9pm. Had the most awesome sleep and got up about 11am this morning. We left our window open as we snuggled under a lovely duvet and slept like babies. Apparently the cold air drifted down the hall and around the corner as Beckie and Kirei shivered all night under a summer weight duvet that isn’t quite as warm as ours!! Oh well – as long as your guests are happy – right!!?

We are off to Dublin and Molly Malone tomorrow for the long weekend. So I’ll have more pictures to post and stories to tell next time. When planning this trip, it worked out that everyone wanted to see us in May which makes this month insanely busy. The 2 months will go by very quickly. Just before we left Nanaimo, we made contact with a fellow sailor we met on the Rhone who lives part time in Italy and part time in London. Luckily he is in Italy in May when we are total booked  (he has to go back to vote) but we’ll meet up with him in June either in London or here in Milton Keynes. So another visit to look forward to.

Beckie is doing well - very busy at work and Kirei at 9, almost 10, is only a few inches shorter than me. I’m impressed all over again with the school system here – they are doing Macbeth (!!!) this year in grade 5. Incredible! They love it here and if life continues as it is now, they see themselves here for the long run, perhaps retiring to Spain or France. Reason enough for me to live forever – LOL.

Today we went into the nearest villages – Ulney and Newton Pagnall - for some shopping and lunch. And of course the obligatory stop at a pub for a lager and lime for me and a Strongbow cider for Phil. No pictures this time as I have to work out how to download and save to the Cloud which I haven’t done before. So I’ll have pictures of Dublin for you.

The weather is holding so far – perhaps not quite as warm as Nanaimo at the moment but still nice.

Much love to you all – Sharlene and Phil (happily ensconced with family and in English comfort?)