House Hunting

Hubby and I are sort of househunting...not to buy(I wish! sigh!) but to rent cos our landlord for reasons unknown have not been paying his loan so the flat we are staying at now will be repossessed and we might be kicked out or the rent might increase...we don't know yet cos the bloody bank hasn't got back to us!

anyways, so we thought we might as well go look at houses under HardCastles.

First, it was in a village called South Cerney. On the way in, you have to go pass a water park and 2 or 3 boating places! Was worried about being surrounded by water! beautiful small village, 3 mins to drive from end to end...sigh...but gorgeous buildings...all yellow stonewalls, this is the pub where we met Penny who showed us the houses. all the houses looked 'old' like that. This village started in AD999! However, the place we looked at was rather run down.

Then we went to Cirencester(siren-cess-ter)...it took me a while to get the name right... LOvely lovely town with yellow stone walls...lots and lots of shops in the town! but no train station....here, we looked at a small and very cute stone cottage in the middle of town, very small tucked in between buildings but it was too dark in the house. And the outside was very unkempt. It looked nowhere near like the picture.

Then it was round the corner to this place. modern, well kept, parking space, quiet and in town... but the house number...it's No.4... I'm chinese! I don want to live in No.4 ...hehe
Next, our favourite for the day! 2 houses on a farm. baa baa black sheep down just outside the garden wall, rolling hills, small backyard, the right one had a fantastic new kitchen, the left one had a big garden...so difficult to choose! but we liked the place. and it's was only 5 mins to town thru a backroad...
Decisions, decisions, decisions!!! hehe... going to look at more properties online and see what else there is... so much fun!

Friends' Weekend-Pt 2: Shillington

Right, so the next day after dinner with Phil and Sati, we took a train back to Reading in the morning and went over to get our hired car cos we were driving up to Shillington which is north of London I think. It's a VW Polo i think, nice little car.
But first things first, we drove over to See Woo and went shopping for Chinese food!!! Bought enough noodles to last me a month and bought kangkung and seaweed snacks and things to make sushi and bought frozen tilapia and grouper..heheh I never thought I would buy fish!

Then we drove up to see Andy and Kat who just had a baby a couple of months ago. As usual we had to go the scenic route through the countryside. so much I was a bit sick of the countryside after hours and hours of it! We went thru so many towns I can't remember their names and was too busy looking to remember to take pics..hehe...We stopped at Dunstable I think, a place where ppl go to fly kites! there were so many kites and children and adults were having so much fun.

We booked a room at the Yew House B&B and it was a normal sized room but with an ensuite bathroom which was tiny and had a tiny closet built beside the bathroom and there was a sink at the other end of the room.

The white door is the ensuite and the blue door is the closet.


This next one is a pic of the common bathroom outside. I love the mirror and the faucets and the landing decorated with the wooden horse. And there were lots of chinese vases all over the place so I asked the landlord and he said he's been collecting vases and china antique pieces for years now.


ok. then we went to visit Rick's friends and I love the dog. She is gorgeous!
We had chinese takaway for dinner and Rick had a lot of fun catching up with them and seeing the baby and drinking wine, while the dog had fun sitting on me.

The next morning, it's breakfast at the conservatory while looking out the windows at the gorgeous garden.

Then it's time for one more picture before hitting the road home and as usual, it was the scenic route home before he got tired of driving and we took the M4 home quick..haha...

To Wales

We attended a wedding in a hotel in Wales. It was such a simple affair. They had the civil wedding at a hotel in St Davids, Wales. Very short ceremony and a nice simple lunch of leek and potato soup, Welsh lamb and 3-chocolate dessert. Here are pics of the bride and groom,

the garden where the guests hang around while the wedding couple disappeared for a while,

a little man in a suit

and a pic of Rick and I. Rick in a tie is a rare occasion! So enjoy!

There is a TOLL after Seven Bridge where people have to pay to get into Wales!!! I was actually so happy! And the toll attendant was so polite!!! I wish I could put up a pic but all the pics of Wales in my camera were erased because Rick's Mac doesn't like my camera! Stupid thing! I had pics of the little town(St Davids is a very small town), and of the seaside and the interesting farm houses and a church we passed, but they re all gone so I'm very annoyed.

Oh and here are 2 pics of the very beautiful and interesting tiles on the hotel room and toilet walls! There are pics of flowers personified in lovely short poems. Downstairs are tiles of the history of the famous people or royal family history of Wales.

long walk

went for a very very long walk today... including getting lost, we walked for 12 miles!!!! my legs hurt and i hv blisters...

Sussex-Part 4: Beachy Head

Finally the last part of my Sussex trip...hehehe...so this is Beachy Head where, according to James, a lot of people go to commit suicide. When i gathered enough courage to get out of the car, i nearly (seriously!) got blown away cos the wind was sooooo strong. I got back in the car in a hurry!!! and I'm not exaggerating! I steeled myself and braved the cold wind and walked down to the beach which sadly has pebbles instead of sand. and there were people who were surfing in the bloody cold water. The cliffs are white because they are chalk.



See how big the waves were?



We went to the other part of Beachy Head where the lighthouse is...






see how gorgeous the view is?







oh! and i got greeted very enthusiatically by this beautiful dog who came up on me from behind and scared me and the dog insisted on licking my hand when he/she had to say goodbye...hehehe

Sussex-Part 1: Interesting things on the way

We passed so many places that my tip to Sussex is still a blur to me in some places...lol..

this is an interesting signpost we saw in Seven Oaks. While we were stuck in a jam there, i saw cobbled streets!!! Cobbled streets are so pretty to look at from far though a killer for high heels! Sexen Oaks looked really interesting with plenty of shops and cafes...I will have to go there one of these days... and the interesting bit about many towns or villages in England is that on some streets, people's front doors literally open out onto the main roads. Its like all you hv to do is take two big steps and u r on the main road with oncoming traffic... How cool is that??? Dangerous but cool.


This pub, The Squirrel Inn is a pub where we stopped for a drink in Bexhill if I remember correctly. I know this pub doesn't look like much...I'll try to get pics of nicer looking pubs.... Bexhill-by-Sea is a small town down by the south coast of England. The town itself is nothing much to look at (sorry, James!) but some of the houses there are big which i think is great cos these are the old houses that were built a long time ago so they are bigger, unlike the newer ones which are small and narrow.

We also passed by a place called Battle which is so named because this was where the Battle of Hastings was fought in 1066. The way I understand it is Harold who was the advisor to the dying King Edward was named to be the King of England. And there were two other rivals for the crown. So King Harold managed to kill Hardrada of Norway when he attacked from the north. Right after that, William of Normandy attacked from the south. So King Harold went south to defend his crown. But he died so William of Normandy became King of England. Hehehe..would it help if I say William of Normandy is William The Conqueror?? Go read up on it if you want to know more.

Another interesting place is Windmill Hill. Actually i just liked the name. And they do have a small windmill which is a small local tourist attraction. I was going to steal a pic of that from James's mother's camera but forgot.

hehe...there's a Proton distributor in Coohen I think. Ya, our Proton! And because it's supposed to be summer now, fresh fruits are sold along the roads. Fruits like strawberries and raspberries. No, I'm not a fan of strawberries though i hv to admit the strawberries Peng Peng and I ate at Paris were the sweetest and biggest I've ever seen or tasted.

The Long Man of Wilmington

One of the things we saw during my trip to Sussex was The Long Man of Wilmington near Eastbourne. As its name suggests, it is very long... hehehe.. it's supposed to be 235 feet high on the slopes of Windover Hill in Wilmington. This can be seen from a long long way off because they restored and put concrete blocks on it and kept the blocks painted white so that people can see it from miles away.

The origin of this, as with a lot of things, is unknown. Nobody can figure out why it is there or who put it there. But they do know that long long ago, the Long Man could only be seen under certain light conditions and after light snowfall. Then, people had it marked out in yellow bricks but got the feet positions wrong, the things the Long Man is holding wrong , changed the helmet-shaped head ( they changed this cos it resembled a 'helmeted war god' and was and still is one of the sites where druids and pagans give thanks to nature) and left out details of its manhood (apparently because of the prudish Victorians according to the website http://www.sussexpast.co.uk/property/site.php?site_id=13) Then in 1969, it was restored by concrete blocks so it can be seen a long way off like from the car park at the Wilmington Priory where we took these pictures.

As you can see from the picture, on the day we went, the wind was very strong and it was very cold. But you can see the Long Man in the picture standing on my palm...wahahaha...

A trip to the Countryside

a horse statue in a field... no idea what it symbolises... but it looks really majestic i think


a backroad which the GPS directed us on... Rick has to choose the longest route thru the countryside...we got stuck in a locked field with cows and a bull on the loose...


field of poppies... they grow wild in the countryside... beautiful from far


a countryside house... Rick's car

Medmenham Walk

My First Walk-Medmenham
ok so the first adventure was a walk Rick took me on. now, walk to me means a stroll through the park... but... no! sigh! some of you may know of my aversion to exercising??? anyways, we went on one of those circular walk thingies that starts at a pub and you walk for MILES round the area and come back to the pub again.. so we started at a pub called 'Dog and Badger'. I was rather excited thinking 'oh wow! a nice leisurely walk through a field or the countryside... easy!' sigh!!! first, we had to look for the start of the trail which was hidden at the opposite side of the road. naturally, when u r looking for something, u'll never find it at the first attempt. we didn't so we ran back across the road through a patch of... NETTLES!!!!! i assure u, it was NOT fun! when we finally found it, SIGH!!! we had to walk up a steep hill!!! by the time we got to the top, i was ready to scream except i had no breathe or energy left to talk and was too proud to quit!!! but the view was great... i have to admit, the walk (i still think of it as jungle trekking through the countryside) through the big green fields, forest reserves, seeing wild squirrels, ducks on the River Thames, sheep grazing, wild flowers... it was fun and so worth the effort! and oh!... lol... the pub was in fact an Italian restaurant!!!! i really don recommend ravioli with orange peel...it was...a very interesting taste... but bread dipped in balsamic vinegar and olive oil is fantastic!