Are we cut out for London?

A trip to London Town was well overdue. Daughter in the midst of revision for test week at school…a whole weekend away was out of the question, so a day trip on the train to primarily see a textiles exhibition was ideal. We have an incredibly early start, on the train for 6.40. We treat ourselves to a bacon buttie and a coffee from the buffet and we are there…London baby.

The Textiles museum doesn’t open until 11 am so we hop on a bus to Oxford Street. It’s just gone 9 am, which appears to be the perfect time to go to one of the busiest shopping streets known to ladies with a desire to spend. No other shoppers. Unfortunately not all the shopkeepers are there either - 10 am start - what southern softies. From the bus we spy a desirable open shop and all pile in. I wander round aimlessly, wife and child spot the sale rail. New skinny jeans tried on and purchased all before 10 am! Impressive. That's teenagers for you. Right - on to Muji!

Textile time. On the tube and on foot to Bermondsey. Lots of walking, but it's in the glorious sunshine to it's all good.

John Rombola "circus scene'

We love love love the textiles. Artists textiles form Picasso to Warhol. There were fabric samples, videos, stories, dresses made out of the fabric from the relevant eras, women bending Maisie’s ear saying when I was your age I would have loved a dress like that and a decent cafe. All happy. 

Still life with jug

We head off in a Tate Modern direction. I’d located a Sushi bar which looked fun. What’s this? Closed! Pah. We are hungry and choose the restaurant opposite which looks OK. Trendy with trendy prices but very acceptable, even provided a still life should you wish to sketch at the table. We didn’t. 

Cy Twombley 'Untitled'

After a bit of stamping around the Tate, catching up with old favourites...it's cut out time. "Henri Matisse The Cut Outs" Along with hoards of others we are filed into the exhibition. We met up with my cousin and all together we vaguely manage to translate some of the accompanying text to his artist's book 'Jazz'. We are in awe of Matisse's cutting out skills and loved the video of him pointing with a large stick at his art work. Assistants then dutifully pinned the scrap of paper to the wall as directed, all under his watchful eye. I want to do that! I wonder if child would be amenable to being my assistant? Moving on...I really appreciated seeing images only previously seen in reproductions. I loved seeing the holes left by the drawing pins, the imperfections in the paper and the scale of the work. Cut outs - far out!

How much more stamping around can we do? Not much. Weary day trippers head back to the train, back to home and to bed. We didn't see the queen but we had a right royal time. 

Every one was taking this shot...so I did.

Fell Trail Fit?

It's that time of year when crazy ideas arrive in one's brain. Take running up a really steep hill and down again for example. I took part in the local fell race last year....as a  marshall...the organiser saw me running up the road and said "I don't know if you are interested, but I organise the local fell race" He obviously hadn't clocked that I was gasping for breath after only barely reaching a run up the gentle incline of our road...I was however happy to help. Anyway...this year I'm thinking "why not?"

Several things do come to mind as to why not
1) It's up hill
2) It's back down a steep hill over rough terrain
3) There are menacing looking sheep up there
4) I'm an unfit middle aged weak ankled lazy cake eating librarian
4) Did I mention the uphill bit? 

So I did the sensible thing...contacted friend of friend Andrea for some hill/fell running tips and to run the route with me after work one evening. (She's a proper runner (and swimmer and biker) check out her blog: Trepid Explorer)

I run around the countryside to prepare for this, I ran around the coast track in Cromer (to be recommended - it's lovely) and the evening of the test run arrived. I drive home from work and there's a glimmer of hope on the horizon. Actually the glimmer is thick fog...here's me thinking nobody in their right mind will want to run up a hill into that? How wrong can one be. My new personal trainer arrives, with back up in the form of husband...they quickly quash any ideas of whimping out in favour of a light skip around in lower territory.

Then they pull on all the running gear, I don my grotty old trainers and a sweat shirt and there's no turning back. Off we trot. Unfortunately I didn't even quite make it out of the village at a run. Resorting to large strides...we get to the start of the countryside bit. Into the fields and the territory of the wild sheep. My running companions are skipping around like mountain goats whilst I concentrate on not throwing myself on the ground to demand a helicopter take me back to the sofa.

There's more hill, then a bit more, thank goodness for gates to open and maps to read. More hill...I hear occasional "ooh look at the lambs" "awhh look at their lovely ears". If I'd had the ability to speak at this point, I may have muttered "never mind the ****** lambs my lungs are about to explode"

We see what I hope is the summit several times and then finally, finally in the mist I think the summit is achieved. The view is stunning I expect, all we can actually see is a few sheep and trees. The valley below is completely obscured by thick fog. 

We jog around a bit, trying to find the right track a little error involving a scramble over a fence and a very loud bleating at by several indignant sheep and their lambs, and hooray some flatness. Flat I can do. Also the advantage of being very warmed up at this point. 

Running running, avoiding sheep, a bit of 'pacing' (aka walking in fell race terminology) and looking out for the giant transmitter arial thing on Calver peak which should be on our right at this point...oops it's on the left. Oh well, we trot down the hill the same way we come up, at least our error of navigation hadn't meant we'd fallen down a mine shaft. We run down to the bottom of the road and up a part of the track which is actually the end of the official fell run route. At the first gate, Andrea bravely decides to carry on running for half an hour, for me and Andy it's back to the comfort of a nice dry house.

I ran 4.99 miles according to my phone...bugger, should have gone just that little bit further. However in reality, I didn't think I would ever move again, both lots of calf muscles objecting strongly to any movement, lots of stretching and a hot shower to enable shuffling to the sofa.

Today is the next day....oh my word, there is not a muscle in my body that is not complaining. 

I'm so doing that again on Saturday...Calver Fell Race watch out...here I come! (Weather permitting  - wether I chicken out maybe! Watch this space)

Home alone

Well the child is in France and we are left moping around the house without her. However, even though she is not here, somehow we end up doing a Guide thing anyway. She's raising money for her Japan Jamboree trip in 2015 and the Guide leader said we could do a craft stall at the coffee morning. 

Cue finger puppet rabbits and 'Totes Amaze Bags'

We set up our stall, we purchase coffee and cake. There's loads of cake. We await the villagers. Make finger puppets and they will come! 

Our punters arrive, mainly of the older generation very keen on the idea of a chin wag, a cup of coffee and cake. It was a lovely raucous village atmosphere. All were appreciative of our crafts, plenty of purchases made, we ate loads of cake, took cake home and caught up with neighbours. Then...as if that wasn't an exciting enough day - a trip to the tip. Yay! 

Duck or canard?

Part deux of the French experience

What could top celebrating Burns night for a French teenage experience of Derbyshire life? A trip down a dark cave and scrambling into a boat might not be everyone's cup of tea…but that was what we did.

We drive though the pretty villages of the Hope Valley to the destination of Castleton, famous for it’s Blue John, stalactites and stalagmites. OK, who can tell me how you tell the difference? I was taught stalactites need to hang on tight to the ceiling, and stalagmites need to be mighty strong to build up from the ground. Oh yes - Blue John is actually blue…I’ll be testing you later.

I find a guidebook to the speedwell cavern in French…result. I give this to Clara and the French contingent gather round and read about what was to be expected for the next hour. I find the guide to ask if he knows any French…he doesn’t (except bon-jaw N.B. his accent was way worse than mine.)

We don protective headgear and stumble en masse down the 900 steps to the awaiting boat. In which we are treated to a ride in the cold dark tunnel, accompanied by the guide telling us about the history of mining in a fairly strong Derbyshire accent. Not sure our French students will have covered coal mining, child exploitation and controlled explosions in their English lessons; at least they have the book. There was a particularly low bit of the tunnel and we were encouraged to ‘duck’. I shouted ‘canard’ to alert the French. Apparently its not the same! Amused my fellow English passengers though.

We get out of the boat, we admire the cavern, we take photos, we stare at our shoes, we take a few more photos having convinced ourselves that there is definitely no 3G signal and clamber into the next boat with relief. The tour guide has some funny stories about previous questions from tourists - for example “How many undiscovered caverns are there?” and “Can I take my hat off, I keep banging my head” And I thought the duck joke sank!

Back on the surface, we decide to go for a hot chocolate and perhaps some cake, we felt we deserved it. However, there were eight adults and 10 children in our party. So the Castleton carnival begins. I’m not sure why we ALL felt the need to traipse into every cafe, establish that the remaining one table and three chairs was not sufficient for our party, cause a log jam in the doorway then tramp to the next establishment, but that was what we did. I am sure we are still the talk of the village. At last, a restaurant agreed to make us a hot drink and feed us cake - phew!

Parlez-vous Franglais?

The other week our linguistic skills had a grand workout. We had a French exchange student staying with us so a dusting off of our schoolgirl French was the ordre du jour.

All went well, I quickly learn not to start challenging conversations. For example - launching into a conversation about the history of Sheffield, the steel industry and engineering taught at the University may have been a bridge too far, or pont trop loin even.

We bamboozled the lovely Clara with the Great British Bake Off (with celebrities) on the telly, a trip to the Co-Op, shopping at Meadowhall and an early celebration of Burns night with friends. Yes that’s right, Burns night. You know, because of the strong links between Derbyshire and Scotland.   

I’m not sure how well toasting the meal with whiskey, reading a poem to a plate of unrecognisable food and bagpipes being played with varying levels of skill can be translated to young French people. There was, however, lots of laughter, back up pizza and a movie to watch, which suited everybody.

Some of the laughter was in response to my attempts at the French language. When I was helping clear up “assiette coming through,” which in my mind was a good approximation both French and English all could understand, caused a significant amount of amusement. I was just pleased to remember what the French for plate was. 

Mmmm...bon appetite!

The boys were back in town

An impromptu road trip for our French boys was a lovely New Year’s Eve surprise. A trip to the Hepworth was in order to show off Yorkshire’s cultural side. 

We squashed in to the car and headed for Wakefield. 

The advantage of going NYE is the lack of competition for a parking space, we achieved a boss one and headed on in. 

We had fed the boys a massive brunch in the form of English breakfast - enough bacon to sustain a person for a considerable amount of time. So, of course, the cafe is the first place we went to! After all, our cake levels must have been at an all time seasonal low by this point. The cafe is lovely - good food, friendly staff and the afternoon wintery light was beautiful.

Fortified with cake, hot chocolate and fizzy pop, we headed for the art. As always, all were  impressed by the Hepworth’s collection and intrigued by the visiting shows. Photos of favorite pieces were shot. To the shop then!

NYE was topped off by a top evening at friends in Sheffield - more than happy to include our boys at short notice. Hosts and other guests alike had to kiss everyone twice because of the French element. This seemed to go down well. Our hosts provided a delicious buffet and we then all played a game based on food and etiquette - not my strong point. The boys were happy; a significant number of questions began "What region in France…" They were, however, unhappy when we lost by one point due to a question concerning Finland. C'est la vie.

We waved adieu to the lovely boys on a very rainy New Years Day, making sure they left with a large slab of cake to be consumed in emergencies! We all hope they come again soon.

2013 in pictures

We have had snow, more snow and a little bit more snow, morris dancers, illuminating times, men dressed as women, women dressed as monkeys and said goodbye to my Father.