Bubbles Goes East

Bubbles goes East.

Wednesday March 22^nd to Saturday April 22^nd 2017

5.30 am - It was a very early start as we set out by taxi travelling to Manchester airport. I was very excited. From Manchester to Amsterdam and Amsterdam to Taipei in Taiwan. I had lots of sleeps and watched the film ‘Passengers'

We then caught the bullet train to Kaohsiung travelling at 308km per hour. A very smooth ride and felt like being on an aeroplane. Four hours from one end of Taiwan to the other! Must keep hydrated

The Hotel Kindness lived up to its name and was home for 4 days. Free ice cream, drinks and cakes all day and night! For those of us with jetlag! And big, big beds!

Saturday 25^th March - I went to Matt and Grace’s 4th wedding celebration and was allowed a drink of Red Bull to keep me awake!

Drinking with the Groom and Best Man Haha …….

 I took this picture of the two families.

Sightseeing tour:

I really enjoyed the high buildings we visited. Great view of Taipei

With my new friend

Delicious Chinese Dumplings with the Chen Family

The fruit was good and kept me going

There wasn’t a t-shirt my size sadly!

Harbour light show

Flight to Beijing

Saturday 1st April- Off to Beijing in China

To the most awful hotel in a dodgy area!! The taxi got stuck down a back ally and there was a broken down lorry. Lots of public toilets because a lot of the old traditional houses built around a courtyard don’t have a bathroom. Just one night and then to a Novatel the next morning – 3* Luxury!

Visited the Ming Tombs

What a way to travel!

and The Great Wall of China

 

Wednesday 5^th April - A 6 hour bullet train journey to Xi An to the Hotel Grand Mecure and to see the The Terracotta Warriors

My mates down to size at the Terracotta Warriors. Very friendly really – they just look fierce!

Here's a distant Chinese relative –

Can you see me?

 

Saturday 8^th April – off to Miri in Borneo to stay at the Marriott Hotel.

Loved it – Sunbathing, swimming, shoe boating and dolphins

 

Off to Brunei on Sunday 9^th April to see some more friends. George the Gecko, Prakriti and Marcel Monkey.

I also went to Hornbill School – that was a good day

Friday 14^th April - Had a lovely Easter weekend at the Empire Hotel in Brunei

 

Afternoon tea at the Empire Hotel. Even these tiny cakes were too big for me! Followed by a beautiful sunset

18th April – Flew to Kuala Lumpur for four days

 

King Kong Bubbles on The K Tower.  Petronas Towers at night        

Next trip the moon maybe?.......

Around the Acres in Allestree

25^th April 2017

With weather forecasts set for a continuation of winter, intrepid explorers Alison, Maggie and Helen J arrived at Allestree Nature Reserve bang on time. We were sadly missing Pam, Jo, Helen M and Charlotte, who had the cutest reason for not being able to attend….

 

Woodstock looking after poorly lamb…

In glorious sunshine, but with a biting wind, we soon headed off to the comfort of the bar.

‘Why am I surrounded by all these men?’

 

We learned that there is not much history to the house itself other than the building was once owned by several wealthy landowners and it was rebuilt at one point to become a Grade II listed building. Courtesy of a bit of scaffolding it is now not listing but it is on the Heritage At Risk Register… probably the equivalent of Ofsted for buildings.   But it was with incredible foresight, that the original landowner bought enough land to ensure a future playground for grown-ups

 

 

 

The trophy hunters… Ding! Dong!

 

When the last owner was killed by lightning strike in the grounds, the hall was sold to Derby City Council for a mere £23,000. It is just such a pity that the babes hadn’t even been a twinkle in their parents’ eyes at the time, because it would have made a marvellous retirement home for us all.  Although, we would have had to cope with a right hoi-polloi of Nordic walkers and dog walkers on our doorstep.

 

With glorious views of a rabbit,  we caught up with Maggie’s latest breakfast outing to Tebay Services and Alison’s views on young, alpine chamber-boys, whose advantage of a private education appears to be lashings of confidence. Their only disappointment seemed to be that they were expecting to be catering for a rather famous comedian, but we are sure that Pete didn’t disappoint.  Thoughts also turned to our own levels of fitness and we were not sure whether it is our age, but high level mountain-walking does seem to be a bit more daunting than it used to be.  Unless of course, you chair-lift up and ski down.

Keen to prove to ourselves that we were reasonably fit for a quick walk around Derby’s largest nature reserve, we set off under blue skies, keeping an eye on the threatening clouds to the east. Skies are wonderful things to behold, unless of course, one is stranded with a broken-down hire car on the top of Mount Teide as night time approached. Clearly the latest holiday car adventure from yours truly, but towing trucks lit up in glory do not mix with stargazers anxiously attempting to identify every galaxy before the moon made a full appearance.

Stargazing could become a potential GB activity, but that is for the future as we had more pressing identifications to make. Whilst being reasonably confident about our bird knowledge, we felt a little lost without Jo, Lynn and Helen M’s plant expertise, but we had a good crack at it.

Bluebells in the wood

 

Dandelions in the field

Red campion in the hedgerows

 

But only one oak leaf...

We also saw celandine, a few nettles and an escaped narcissi, but we are not sure whether that counts or not.

 

Whilst crossing the road from the woods to the fields, we played ‘guess which footballer lives here’ but sadly there were no viewings of Cloughie Jnr this time; he’s probably found a new place to play pokemon.

Views across the fields in Quarndon were stunning

As were the views in the edge of the field…

 

 

With time pressing we tested our ability to gear up to the next level and set off at a brisker pace back down through the woods

 

More bluebells…..

But just as we got out into the open we were caught in a bit of wintry weather pretending to be cherry blossom and it was cold. We felt lucky it wasn’t lightning.

Tee, hee!

Lunch was a full-on-flavour soup of garlic, mushroom and white wine complete with garlicky croutons and iced buns plus a croque-madame for Lynn with lashings of award winning lemon oil.  Sorry Lynn… was it the award winning lemon oil you wanted on your garnish? And a few minutes later, with full apologies from the chef, the hot-not-cross buns arrived.  

A belated birthday gift for Maggie ….

Behold a thing of beauty….

What was that about a small, aged, rust bucket?

 

She can’t resist another peek…

 

 

Whilst Lynn is waiting for the tooth fairy to arrive tonight, Helen’s ongoing saga with her dentists and now depleting bank balance continued to amuse.  There will be another instalment soon, one is sure of it….

A bit of forgetfulness also seems par for the course with getting older.  But the best tip of the day is: take photos of the inside of your cupboards and stick the photo on the outside!  Being a super domestic goddess, Maggie will, of course, have beautifully neat photos to reflect the state of her cupboards, whilst some of us…. Ooops, there is a downside to this tip!

When talking about how we all ended up at Gell, and with her ‘salad days’ not yet over,  Lynn won the award for the most interesting story of her career. However, it was all too soon before we need to say cheerio to Lynn. Hugs later, the rest of us strolled down the lane for a bit of animal therapy.

 

The horse whisperer gets to work…

 

Two legs good...

Four legs.. a bit better...

 

Bird list for the day…

Blackbird

blue tit

buzzard*

canada goose

chiffchaff*

crow

dunnock

great tit

jackdaw

magpie

mallard

pied wagtail

robin

swallow*

wood pigeon

 

15 for the day… and considering how cold it was, not bad.  Starred are the new for this year.  And in the drive back down, Helen J saw  a greater spotted woodpecker, a lapwing and a pheasant. But, unfortunately no garganey….as Maggie had used up our allocation of rarely seen birds in Leighton Moss! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Woofy wintry wharf walks

20th March 2017

 

Cromford

 

Today marked the celebration of International day of Happiness and what better way to spend it than with other babes.  With attempts to wave winter away thwarted, the babes had to settle for some mini-wet-walks sandwiched between sustenance and rather a lot of newsworthy news.

 

Walk number one, to satisfy the wee one, took place exactly on time starting at Cromford Wharf.  With Betty sporting a rather fancy fleece lined jacket, Maggie and the Helens set off in clothing to match the mood of the day.  Maggie, fresh from Crufts, had waggy tales of her own to tell and we all agreed that Betty would probably end up being a YouTube star for all the wrong reasons!  Sadly no photos as it was just too darned wet!

 

Our first coffee of the day at the Wharf café  saw us sighing with Alison, sporting a light ski tan, at the endless holiday possibilities to which Bubbles is invited. But, please take note of Alison’s advice: make sure you don't take out Bubbles' passport in error,

 

or you could be done for identity fraud ...

 

How many stamps will Bubbles achieve on her eastern tour with Jo?

 

However, Helen J not to be outdone just yet, and whilst already booked up for this year, somehow came away from a chance meeting in the café and ended up with a trip to Italy in the offing.  The cheek of it and she conveniently forgot to mention that she would only go if the babes came with her.

With the weather not brightening up at all, we ventured out on walk number two and marvelled at how lovely the views were even in the rain.  With a little bit of flower spotting, dog’s violet being Betty’s favourite,  we managed to get to the High Peak Junction  before a quick turn around, as lunch was beckoning.

 

Somehow Lynn managed to book a table at Parkery’s Eatery (what a mouthful),  timing it perfectly so that we missed out ..

 

on a right royal do...

 

 

But, whilst waiting for our lunch, Maggie brazenly announced a good way to get Senior Citizen discounts…’ just pretend to be older’…

 

Which clearly wouldn’t work on the Helens….

 

Note: Picture enlarged using the mobile phone magnifier,

for those who haven't got their glasses on! 

 

 

And, with impeccable timing,  Pam arrived.

 

 

Not at all excited about her Very Recent news!

 

 We mostly listened to Pam outlining  how she and others have managed to pull off this great feat and quietly wondered whether we would see Pam more or less from September and decided it would be ‘more-or-less’ the same.

 

Halo, halo, halo...six glam babes in the café..

 

After a fantastic leek soup with garlicky croutons, plans are definitely in the pipeline for another meet up here, with some tempted by the toppling tower of afternoon tea, but this isn’t every babe’s cuppa tea. Even the thought of it made us attempt another jaunt to ‘walk off those futuristic calories’ but not before frisking Lynn who had looked rather lovingly at the cutlery far too many times.

 

So walk number three started again back at the Wharf with only a slight delay whilst waiting

 

for Lynn to stop chatting to everyone she knows in Cromford.

 

It’s silhouette competition time!

 

‘If you are going to march properly, Pam,

take your hands out of your pocket!’

 

 

But, this time, even though the rain had virtually stopped, it was just one bridge too far and time preyed on those who needed to leave. So, with a quick ‘about turn’ we retreated back to… guess where?  And anyway, even Betty was experiencing a bit of deja-vu-vu-vu…

 

So with cheerios to Lynn and Helen M, a very creative decision was made: we walked in the other direction! 

 

Should have walked this way earlier…

the sun was out all the time!

 

It was at this precise point, that Pam revealed her latest venture.  Combining her teaching skills, film knowledge and community mindedness, Pam ‘s home is now her new business centre.  With offers of excellent value-for-money lessons, constant coffee and a very warm home, there is a bit of a concern about her strategic planning but as long as someone doesn’t trip on the stair carpet she’ll be fine.. or fined! For some reason, Pam rejected suggestions of what to call her new enterprise:  Aiming  High at Alton View (bit too like a mission statement), Pam’s Galactics (HJ’s reference at SLT calendar meetings… true), ‘Pam’ll push you real good’ (oh, really!!)

 

Ending up at the Arkwright Mill, we played ‘spot the’ and ‘try to remember the’ ex-pupils and then the conversation took a bit of a nose dive as we talked about rumours of dodgy activities by various teachers (none, at Gell we hasten to add!!)  But the view out of the window was good, even if the coffee was not up to standard (Never ‘eard of a cortado before, Miss, would you like a filter instead?).

 With daylight dwindling, we set off home, knowing that we had made the best of the last day of winter and looked forward to a proper Spring morning.

 

Birds for the day:

 

canada geese

coot

great tit

grey wagtail*

jackdaw*

magpie

mallard

moorhen

pied wagtail

robin

song thrush (heard)

treecreeper*

tufted duck

wood pigeon

 A very good 14 for the day with 3* new for the year.  Running total of 91…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bubbles Goes Skiing

Bubbles on the Slippery Slopes

March 2017

 

Bubbles is really excited to pick up her skis ready for her trip to Austria

 

Arriving at the hotel, Bubbles rushes out onto the balcony to take in the view – wearing her fetching bobble hat that Barnaby has lent her .. in fact she refuses to take it  off all week

 

Bubbles is up and out before the rush. Where is everyone? Has she remembered her sunblock?

 

Sheltering from the sun, before returning to the slopes after a hot chocolate

 

 

local hostelries

 

 Skiing is hungry work, but perhaps Bubbles should have taken one of the smaller plates

 

 

 What holiday is complete without a little romance? However, whilst Barnaby thinks about his next ski trip, Bubbles is thinking of the Far East. Perhaps they will meet up again next year.