Never mind there’s unfettered joy as we head off to Publix supermarket. Alcoholic lemonade, how about that. They call it Hard Seltzer, 5% alcohol, only in America.
Evening see’s the demise of an excellent bottle of Carmenera, too good to allow remains to oxidise overnight, manned up and polished it off – awesome. Finished watching Jack Reacher series.
Wednesday
A gorgeous warm sunny day so we toddle off down to Sarasota Bay Front for a stroll around and a coconut shrimp lunch for Wendy. I get treated to a cup of typical black American dishwater coffee.
Then have a stroll around Sarasota and Wendy is orgasmic as she gets a visit to WholePayPacket (aka Wholefoods). Then, despite having to pay a Kings ransom for everything, no wonder they hide the prices, she begrudges me some Shark Steak and Mahi for tea.
What a great start to the day as I open the door to see how warm it is and there on a palm tree is a beautiful red bellied woodpecker singing his morning song.
What is it with USPS. Every time we encounter them they seem to screw up. They missed yesterdays delivery deadline, then claimed they’d delivered it at 14:55 today. Alas no parcel on the doorstep. Turns out the parcels small enough to hammer into the post box on the street. As a Brit we expect delivery to the door. Just one of the things that we excel at.
Thursday
Lazy morning but then off to a free Big Band concert in Phillipia Park. Then have a stroll around the park and Wendy enjoys her butty for lunch. Sat watching them fish and just about escape having an eye removed by a casting shrimp on a hook.
Back down to Turtle beach for some beach time, but after 30 minutes we’re melting. Back home for afternoon tea and some reading. My it’s hot. Take to the shade.
Free Oceans Eleven Big band performance in the park, in the sun, with all the rest of the waiting for god brigade. Is this what life’s come to? And now, as predicted, some geriatrics get up shuffle around. Sad but by the time some of then manage to get to the dance concrete the songs over. Not exactly dirty dancing. A bit like a Deer Valley concert sat in our deer valley approved chairs. No wonder there’s so many vultures circling above.
Friday
Another glorious hot sunny day. Take an afternoon stroll down to Turtle beach. Sit and watch the Pelicans entertain us. Then a major sin as we go to a bar and have a beer before 17:00. Wendy has a rum and coke and then staggers home – lightweight.
Try to sit out on the deck but it’s just too hot so end up in the shade outside our rental. Then our friendly little red bellied woodpecker comes around and starts chirping away. He’s also very good at catching flies. Try tempting him with his bird call on my iPhone.
Eventually Wendy gives up on watching “The Apprentice” and serves afternoon tea. Her head is still spinning from that drink.
Saturday
Leaving day. We have to be out by 10:00 or they very arrogantly offer to charge us another full day.
Because I want to avoid the crazy interstates toll roads it’s a five hour drive across florida. 150 mile of nothingness. Just scrubland and cattle, wot no cowboys. Very little signs of habitation and it’s at least a 50 mile walk if you run out of petrol.
Finally arrive after 5 hours and stop off for a dirty Chai at Starbucks before driving down to the nearest Home Depot to order a Wyze Doorbell Pro for Kurt. No chance of ordering it online as the clusterfuck website designers – 10 year olds whose mummy has to tie their shoelaces for them and have no idea that there are other countries outside the USA – can’t accept a UK zip code when trying to purchase online.
Finally get to our next home in Pompano Beach for a week. Can’t get in before 16:00. It’s all very nice, clean and modern. But what is it about American houses, they’re always so dark, like going into a funeral parlour, and very rarely have a decent central ceiling light.
I unload the car and then it’s the final tribulation of the day with a visit to Publix for tea and supplies. As soon as I’ve ordered my Reubens, which has kept me motivated all day as I salivated over the thought of it, my threshold of tolerance for this purgatory goes. Get me out of here.
When you think of cowboys first thoughts always go to the Wild West, but Florida was also famous for its cowboys and cattle.
The herds ranged in size from 5,000 to 50,000 head. Rustling was prevalent throughout the state. This was because Florida was an open range. There was not a fenced pasture anywhere in the state and cattle roamed freely. The early cowboys would round cows up over miles and miles of open plains, in the hammocks, and by the rivers and streams. Then they would drive them to market. Florida’s old-time cowboys had a unique way of herding cattle. They used 10- to 12-foot-long whips made of braided leather. Snapping these whips in the air made a loud “crack.” That sound brought stray cattle back into line fast and earned cowboys the nickname of “crackers.” Many rode rugged, rather small horses known as “cracker ponies.”
Cracker cowboys also counted on herd dogs to move cattle along the trail. Their tough dogs could help get a cow out of a marsh or work a hundred steers into a tidy group. For those rough riders of Florida’s first ranges, a good dog, a horse, and whip were all the tools a true cracker needed. By the 1890s, cow camps were located in most sections of the state. One such camp was located near Lake Kissimmee. It was known as “Cow Town.” The area’s cattle were referred to as scrub cows, ridiculous in appearance. They were once described as “no bigger than donkeys, lacking quality as beef or milk producers.” They were valuable because the animals could survive in wilderness areas. By the 1920s, however, the quality of Florida cattle had improved greatly. Raising cattle is still one of the biggest businesses in the state. Florida’s ranchers raise the third largest number of cattle of any state east of the Mississippi. Their herds represent many centuries of dreams. They link the sweat and success of ancient Spaniards and hardy pioneers with today’s modern cattle ranchers.
Driving along and just seen a major sign saying “Report impaired drivers”. We assume that includes mentally impaired. Wendy gets the iPhone out and starts snapping away. Within an hour her iPhone has run out of memory.
Don’t we just love VRBO and Airbnb for their cleaning services. They charge a kings ransom for cleaning and then expect that prior to leaving you wash the pots; empty the rubbish; strip the beds; pile up the towels and leave the place as clean as you found it. Anything else? Why don’t they just give me a broom and a mop and I’ll stick them up my arse and finish the job. What do the cleaners do for their money? I’m sure they only get a smidgen of the cleaning fee. Just more profit for VRBO and Airbnb.
Sunday
Lazy do nothing day, just relax.
Much to Wendy’s disgust our VRBO lacks a kettle and storage space for your, not that you would expect visitors to a self catering accommodation to have food items to store. Common sense the world over is under threat from the stupidity virus.
Not only do they want copies of our credit card, sans number, but also our driving license or passport.
They also want a contract signing, it actually has no contractual terms, but just wants your passport number and other information useful to any hacker. Bear in mind they’ve already had most of this information sent them, we have already paid in advance, they have a $500 deposit, plus damage insurance. What purpose does all this nonsense serve? I suppose they might be concerned that an imposter turns up to spend a week in our place!
Then when I turn my Smart DNS on I find that they have a Cisco router in place that block access.
Who are these people? Pettifogging individuals with a severe obsessive compulsive disorder.
Wendy and I have a guessing game as to occupation. Both simultaneously come up with number one occupation being Quality Control. Second is health and Safety.
A lot of visitors around here seem obsessed with the fear of alligators. Here’s a few facts about them.
Once a week is a typical feeding schedule for alligators living in the wild. Excess calories are stored in fat deposits at the base of the alligator’s tail. Incredibly, by burning fat reserves, it is possible for an alligator to last more than two years between feedings.
Alligators primarily eat their prey at dusk or during the nighttime. An alligator’s diet consists mostly on what is available to them as they aren’t known to travel far for a meal.
After death the beasts will either take the carcass into the water and consume it or store it in an underwater den. They eat by biting and do not swallow the prey in its entirety.
What do alligators eat? Alligators primarily hunt at dusk or during the night. They lie motionless in wait for prey. Their prey selection seems to be determined primarily by size.
While still carnivorous, small alligators will often feed on their favorite food, Florida gar, as well as small snails or other crustaceans. The more the alligator grows, the bigger food source it will need. Some of these foods include fish, raccoons, birds, and even other alligators!
Humans are not an alligator’s natural prey. In fact, alligators are inclined to be afraid of 10 minutes humans. However, feeding alligators causes them to lose their natural fear of humans.
Don’t bother running from an alligator they can reach speeds of 30MPH.
They’re not bad to eat either, with popular gator tails.
Monday
Gorgeous sunny and warm day. Take a morning stroll to the outdoor Pickleball site. Just 10 minutes walk to 12 FREE outdoor Pickleball courts. All properly marked out with permanent nets. Even have forms to sit on. Pickleball Florida style.
Then we’re off down to Hugh Taylor Birch State Park. Another $6 saved it’s only 8 miles away but takes 35 minutes with all traffic lights. Can you believe it one every 100 yards in places.
Wendy has her sandwich lunch at the park. We take a stroll across to the Fort Lauderdale beach and then have an amble around the Hammock trail. Take a drive around the park and a stroll down the coastal waterway, wow it’s rough today.
Tortoises here are protected species and they ask you to drive slow to avoid that crunching sound as you go over one. There’s one speeding down the side of the road with a park ranger escorting it for safety, probably to stop the exits picking it up or taking it home. How neat is that.
Ever wonder why America has a serious obesity problem? Well this free ride to save a 5 minute walk may help answer that.
Then it’s an aborted visit to Wholefoods, apart from getting some Sumo oranges and Ethiopian coffee, followed by a visit to Publix. Two supermarkets in one day is just two too many. A real trial of my threshold of tolerance.
Back home to afternoon tea on our patio.
Momentous joy, Wendy has fallen out with Wholefoods. For the second time she couldn’t get the vitals we needed. She’s promised no more visits to whole paypacket this trip. Result. Praise be to the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Take me to the church
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Lazy start as usual then off to Myaka State park for the Nth time this lifetime.
Had lunch sat in our Tommy Bahamas chairs watching the gators and Herons fish. I’m sure they’re the same gators from two years ago, maybe they’re even Disney animatronics.
Tree walk at Myaka.
Strolled over to the other gator feeding spot – avoiding the snake infested long grass this time – but alas no gators crunching on a turtle like last time. Then of course we had to do the tree walk.
Back home for chowder, crab and fish tea from Captain Curts. Not cheap but pretty good and plenty of it. Time for wine and a rubbish Netflix film on Heaven.
Mrs Osprey waiting for dinner.
Just our luck as we’re the first in line to get stopped at the drawbridge traffic lights. But on the plus side we get to watch a male Osprey zoom into it’s nest with a fresh striped fish wriggling from it’s talons. It seems that Mrs Osprey was not satisfied with todays lunch as he ended up promptly flying off with it. Women!
Wednesday
Lagoon at Oscar Shearer.
Wow, up and out for 09:30, off to pickleball. Outdoor, open play with a random wind to spice things up.
After lunch we’re off to Oscar Shearer State Park. Have a pleasant stroll around and just about manage to get a mile in. Sit on the lagoon beach to enjoy the sun. Note our backs to the water, let’s hope no gators decide to creep up on us.
Then it’s back home for afternoon tea and sat around the deck drinking and talking to a couple of very friendly retired nurses until sunset. Very interesting. Americans are so friendly, this would never happen in the UK.
Waiting at traffic lights in the USA.
It’s bad enough spending your whole waking life in America sat at traffic lights, people need to bring their nail cutters with them. But here they have something even more sole destroying, a draw bridge that then causes a 30 minute traffic delay. No doubt, for health and safety reasons, it’s raised every time a kayaker goes under to ensure he has at least 100 foot of clearance to avoid banging his head. All the delay because no one has ever sat down and thought about how to time the subsequent traffic lights to alleviate the delay. Not a skerrit of common sense, shear lunacy, someone should be shot for such blatant stupidity.
Thursday
Off kayaking from our condo.
Off out for lunch with Nancy and Dennis, old friends from a home exchange.
Go to Der Dutchman an Amish restaurant, serving traditional Amish food. A unique experience. Have a pleasant lunch with Nancy and Dennis discussing old times and putting this crazy, senseless world to rights. What always amazes me is how many things we and our friends agree upon yet the world is dominated by the crazies, the wokes, the libtards and the snowflakes. Perhaps it’s time for us oldies to stop being the silent majority and restore some common sense.
These free kayaks are a tad skittish.
Then it’s off for Wendy’s special treat with trip to Wholefoods in downtown Sarasota.
Oh no, not yet another religion. That’s all the World needs. At least this one doesn’t seem to involve an Angel, mysterious revelations or death threats.
The Amish (/ˈɑːmɪʃ/; Pennsylvania German: Amisch; German: Amische) are a group of traditionalist Christian church fellowships with Swiss German and Alsatian Anabaptist origins. They are closely related to Mennonite churches. The Amish are known for simple living, plain dress, Christian pacifism, and slowness to adopt many conveniences of modern technology, with a view neither to interrupt family time, nor replace face-to-face conversations whenever possible, and a view to maintain self-sufficiency. The Amish value rural life, manual labor, humility, and Gelassenheit, all under the auspices of living what they interpret to be God’s word.
Amish church membership begins with adult baptism, usually between the ages of 16 and 23. Church districts have between 20 and 40 families, and worship services are held every other Sunday in a member’s home or barn. The rules of the church, the Ordnung, which differs to some extent between different districts, is reviewed twice a year by all members of the church. The Ordnung must be observed by every member and covers many aspects of day-to-day living, including prohibitions or limitations on the use of power-line electricity, telephones, and automobiles, as well as regulations on clothing. Generally, a heavy emphasis is placed on church and family relationships. The Amish typically operate their own one-room schools and discontinue formal education after grade eight. Most Amish do not buy commercial insurance or participate in Social Security. As present-day Anabaptists, Amish church members practice nonresistance and will not perform any type of military service.
Whilst the Amish may eschew power line electricity (AC) they don’t seem to have any issues with a (DC) battery on their electric tricycles. I wonder how they charge them? Perhaps they have to buy a new one when it goes flat!
Whole foods where they show the calories in their products but not the prices.
Friday
Turtle beach.
More outdoor pickleball in the scorching heat.
Then we take a drive down to Siesta village for a stroll around. Not really that much there to see.
Followed by a stroll along Turtle Beach. Get Wendy to sit in a kayak, on land, but I think thats as far as she’ll go.
Mind you don’t drown. Then along came a tsunami.
Back home for afternoon tea on the deck, topped off with a plesant beer.
Decide to watch Question Time on BBC for the first time in ages. Interesting to see anti-vaxers try and argue with a professor of virology, frantically shuffling through their notes to regurgitate some obscure and ridiculous arguments against vaccination.
Start to watch the new series “The Responder” on BBC. What idiot decided to do what could be a good drama with broad Liverpool accents and no sub-titles. It’s just such a terriable, senseless waste.
John Hopkins hospital has done a major analysis on Covid Lockdowns. It comes to a surprising, counter intuitive conclusion, but we need to learn from this ready for future pandemics.
“Overall, our meta-analysis fails to confirm that lockdowns have had a large, significant effect on mortality rates. Studies examining the relationship between lockdown strictness find that the average lockdown in Europe and the United States only reduced COVID-19 mortality by 0.2% compared to a COVID-19 policy based solely on recommendations. Shelter-in-place orders (SIPOs) were also ineffective. They only reduced COVID-19 mortality by 2.9%.
While this meta-analysis concludes that lockdowns have had little to no public health effects, they have imposed enormous economic and social costs where they have been adopted. In consequence, lockdown policies are ill-founded and should be rejected as a pandemic policy instrument.
They also find that – on average – voluntary behavioral changes are 10 times as important as mandatory behavioral changes in combating COVID-19.”
Saturday
Lake Manatee, but despite the name no Manatees.
Leisurely start to the day. Needs to be as I think I’ve caught Wendy’s back disesase. I can hardly get out of bed or walk. Wendy thinks it’s the kayaking / pickleball. I think it’s old age and this bed that is so soft you feel as if it will just swallow you up. Need to write you’re name on your boots before getting into bed.
It’s a grey, overcast day but not cold. The Iguanas are safe in their trees.
We decide to drive over to Lake Manatee state paark for picnic lunch and womble around, given the stae of our backs. There’s not really much there, and not any wildlife, but at least it’s free and making good use of our state park pass.
Then it’s time for my punishment as I’m dragged into a Publix supermarket.
What is it with these aggressive, arrogant and impatient American drivers. Usually in white vans (they’re the same the World over), big trucks or SUV’s with giant tyres. Just a phallic symbol to make up for their shriveled dick and pea-sized brain. If they’re not an exhaust bandit trying to drive up your exhaust pipe they’re lane swap hogs. Try swapping lanes and what does the car behind in the lane you’ve signalled to go into do? They speed up, can’t bear the thought of someone being in front of them. And then they have the brass nerves to pip you. Perhaps the best solution is not to signal so that they have less time to speed up. Total dicks. So aggresive and yet when a pedestrian is around they’re like timid little mice freightened to death of that invisible 200 foot force field around the pedestrian.
Well for all you shrivelled dick, aggresive and impatient American drivers here’s two questions you might try answering:
1 What is safe stopping distance.
Answer:
Safe stopping distance is the time that it takes to bring a moving car to a complete stop. This includes
The time it takes you to react to the hazard (thinking distance), and
The time it takes for the brakes to stop the car (braking distance)
You can calculate it with this stopping distance formula:
Yes, as you can see from the above chart it’s 315 FEET not 31.5 inches.
Thankfully I’m not allowed a gun or else I’d be helping stop pollution of the gene pool with these zounderkites and cockwombles.
Sunday
Siesta Key beach along with all the private beach areas – disgusting – tripping up on trespassers will be prosecuted signs and rope barriers everywhere.
Lazy morning again.
It’s overcast but at least it’s not cold. Decide on a walk up to the centre of Siesta Key, it’s about 1.7 miles. Have a stroll onto the beach as the sun comes out. Then go to have an afternoon drink and listen to some music, but Wendy can’t find anything she fancies to drink, so we don’t bother. Wendy catches the free shuttle back whilst I walk it. Need to try and get some exercise in to fix this back.
Afternoon tea on the deck but alas the suns hiding.
Another article for my scrap book of favourable coffee or wine studies.
Is coffee good for your gut? A new study shows the beneficial impact on gut bacteria.
Coffee is associated with brain and heart benefits, but new research shows it’s also great for your gut.
If you’re a coffee lover, you’ll be no stranger to the fact that a cup of Joe can get everything moving. But other than keeping things regular, there wasn’t a hugely well-known link between coffee and gut health.
That’s why a study by researchers at the nutrition app Zoe, headed up by Tim Spector from Kings College, decided to look at how coffee impacts digestion – and they found some interesting outcomes. Namely, coffee drinkers tended to have higher microbiome diversity than non-coffee drinkers. It was also dose-dependent, meaning the more coffee your drink, the more diverse your microbiome.
Why is coffee good for the gut?
According to Spector, who spoke about the research on his Instagram account, coffee drinkers were very likely to have a certain bacteria dubbed ‘Freddy’ in their gut. “[It is] one of the key 15 ‘good’ bugs that we’ve linked to healthier blood sugar and fat responses after eating,” he wrote. It’s also linked to improved insulin levels in the body.
The benefits also come from coffee’s polyphenols – micronutrients known for their antioxidant benefits – which “can help reduce the presence of harmful microbes, making room for ‘good’ bacteria and helping them flourish – rocket fuel for your microbes,” Spector adds.
Surprisingly, the benefits could also come from the fact that coffee contains fibre. The fibre in the coffee beans has been shown to pass into the drink, with 100ml of the drink containing between 0.46 and 0.75g of fibre.
It may sound like a small dose, but Spector writes that “if you’re drinking the US average of 3.2 cups a day this could add up to as much as 5g of fibre per day”. Given that most adults only eat 18g of the recommended 30g of fibre a day, according to the NHS, an extra 5g in your coffee could make a huge difference.
Another study also found that the fibre from coffee ferments to produce beneficial short-chain fatty acids and increases the quantity of some bacteria by up to 60% within 24 hours of drinking.
Spector points out that the research has found that some types of coffee have different health benefits, including:
Roast coffee is shown to have higher levels of polyphenols
Adding milk could make polyphenols in coffee less bio-available
All types of coffee have been shown to contain some fibre, but freeze-dried contains the most
The health benefits are also associated with decaf
Large scale studies into over 50,000 people found that drinking coffee of any kind – white, black, decaf or instant – decreases the risk of death, especially gut disease death
Ever wonder how biased news media are? Then consider this:
The Johns Hopkins study on Covid lockdown received no mention on any of the five liberal networks this week. According to Grabien transcripts, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS and NBC all ignored the anti-lockdown findings after having spent much of the pandemic shaming republican states with minimal restrictions and events deemed by critics as “superspreaders.”
It wasn’t just the networks avoiding the study. The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Associated Press, Reuters, USA Today, Axios, Politico among other outlets also turned a blind eye to the findings, according to search results.
How disgusting and biased is that, but what can you expect from a media that thrives on political bias and sensationalist reporting.
Monday
Venice beach.
Lazy start and then off down to Venice beach. Wendy has her lavish lunch sandwich as we sit and enjoy the sun, although it’s a tad breezy evidenced by all the people huddled in the shelter of the lifeguards building. At least it’s warm.
Then we have a stroll around the usual grot and clothes shops in the nice downtown Venice. I think overall we prefer Venice to Siesta Key.
Back home for tea and start watching the new “Jack Reacher” series. It’s pretty good.
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Forecast is for rain all day and for once they’re spot on and it’s not too warm.
Never mind, make the most of it a trip to Wendy’s favourite Publix supermarket, some jigsaw time and a bottle of wine, not before 17:00.
Our America States and America National Parks jigsaws have arrived from Amazon. How sad can we get, but they will help us plan our ROAM – “Rest Of America” – road trip where we catch up on the 7 states we’ve not visited yet and hopefully a lot of the remaining National Parks.
How amazing is it that all these water molecules know exactly what to do and where to go. I don’t know whether you ever stop and think about the amazing science all around us, but it’s all very ingenious.
Wednesday
Yeah, it’s indoor pickleball at the local recreation centre again. Manage a good two hours play without much rest. Best of all It’s FREE.
Then back home and get ready for a rare lunch out. We’re going to have lunch with Mitch and his partner. Mitch was a lifelong friend of our good friend Hal, now departed, and we often met him in PC. As luck would have it he lives just 3 miles North of where we’re staying so got in touch with us about meeting up for lunch.
Had a very pleasant lunch with Mitch and Chuck. Reminiscing about Hal and generally putting the World to rights. Chuck had an interesting career, one of his jobs was stoping the alligators get into Weeki Wachee where his mother was one of the mermaids. He was also a Padi instructor so we got to talking scuba. Nice to see them both and hopefully we’ll catch up with Mitch in PC in the summer.
What’s going on? Been in Hudson Florida now for just over a week and alas no mystery call from any of Jere’s many friends. Why we even had to resort to going out with some of our own friends. There was a time when we could rely on Jerre from PC getting one of his many friends to get in touch to meet up, but it seems he has no mates near Hudson.
Then it’s back home for afternoon tea and a dirty Chai.
Thursday
Lazy morning as usual then off up to Weeki Wachee for a kayak down the river. Wendy comes along but gives the kayaking a miss. It’s a lovely float down with the flow, absolutely no effort. One of the best kayak trips, river is quite shallow you could wade all the way down. Fortunately the suns out and it’s quite warm. Wendy goes for a sandwich in the car and then a stroll around the state park.
After the kayaking we both go for a rangers talk on Floridas wildlife.
Back home for afternoon tea around the pool watching the wildlife in Cow Creek.
Friday
Lazy start dealing with Virgin Atlantic, always an ordeal unless you’re actually on board a plane.
Off down to Honeymoon state park don’t you just love a cafe where tips are compulsory if paying by card and they don’t do coffee. Don’t they not know this is America.
Have a stroll down the osprey trail, see plenty of them along with woodpeckers and other new species never identified before.
Then onto Tarpon Springs sponge docks famous for its Greek community of sponge divers. Now it seems to consist of shops selling soap, sponges, shells and a super abundance of $5 car parks. Like Blackpool in Florida but without the tower, pier, “kiss me quick hats” or funfair.
Turns out we went to Honeymoon beach in 2020, oh what a memory we have.
Saturday
Time to leave our three bedroom, three bathroom luxury and head down to Siesta Key for two weeks.
It’s a pleasant drive down with clear blue skys but the Iguanas will be dropping out of the trees at this temperature. Never mind if we come across one I’m sure we can barbecue it. Manage to check in early. Wot only one bedroom, how will we cope?
Then of course it’s off to Publix for my daily dose of torture. Get settled in. Free bikes and kayaks, but they’re very basic sit on tops with no backrest – oh these first world problems. Pleasant little pool, barbecue area and sheltered deck and loungers. Dock onto the waterway but today it looks a tad wild with the wind.
Sunday
Lazy start to the day. It’s clear blue skies but I think the Iguanas will still be tumbling out the trees.
Just a lazy relaxing day sat around the pool.
Monday
Lazy morning with newspapers and coffee around the pool. Clear blue sky and the Iguanas have stopped falling out the trees.
After lunch off down to Turtle beach. I go kayaking while Wendy sits in a sun trap and gets some sunshine. A couple of hours kayaking around the islands and mangroves, all very leisurely. Alas no gators or manatees.
Then we drive down to Siesta beach, Americas number 1 beach. Perfect very fine white sand, like plaster of Paris. Have a pleasant stroll, then back home for a late afternoon tea. Perfect end to a perfect day. This is the life.
As most American rentals seem to lack a kettle, or if they do have one it’s a stove top kettle with a whistle on it that whistles when the water is boiling. Yes, my American friends, you need boiling water to make tea with. Anyway as our kettle was whistling over breakfast this morning it got me to pondering who was bright enough to dream this idea up. Hop over to Wikipedia for the answer:
A whistling kettle is a kettle fitted with a device that emits an audible whistle when the water in the kettle starts to boil. The action of steam passing through the device causes vibration, in turn creating the sound, known in physics as a tone hole.
The exact mechanism by which this occurs was not fully understood until a paper, The aeroacoustics of a steam kettle, was published by R. H. Henrywood, a fourth-year engineering undergraduate at the University of Cambridge, and A. Agarwal, his supervisor, in the journal Physics of Fluids in 2013.
Harry Bramson is the inventor of the whistling tea kettle.
For the sake of my sanity will Boris please resign. I have to sit here every morning listening to Wendy rant on about Boris being an idiot, liar and should man up and go. Then we have “he’s another arse licker” comments on any minister or politician who supports him. “Can’t stand him” seems to be reserved for any of the arse lickers who she just doesn’t like the look of. Mind you on the plus side it’s stopped her going on about cross channel illegal migrants.
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It’s travel day. The day you just have to write off as complete crap, just grin and bear it. At least if you start out by assuming it’s going to be a nightmare of a wasted day then you’re not disappointed. I’m very tempted to try Wendy’s Propanol but settle for an intoxicated state of euphoria. It’s the price you have to pay to escape from our wet, damp, grey hell hole.
We can go, we can go….
It’s like there are two different universes. Before getting on board with nothing but queues; crap service; delays; stupidity; a complete lack of common sense; not a jot of customer service. Then you board into the big iron bird and it’s a portal to another universe of awesome customer service; they can’t do enough for you; nothings too much trouble; comfort; good food; a cornucopia of alcohol. Believe it or not I actually love flying. It’s just everything leading up to entering that magic doorway I detest, they really couldn’t make the airport experience any more miserable, but I’m sure they’ll try.
I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it, if I was running Virgin Atlantic I’d be issuing brown envelopes to the majority of the managers and lick spittles in admin and land-based back office, and replace them with cabin crew who understand the concept of great customer service.
Just watched “The Father” with Antony Hopkins as an old geezer with dementia. Depressing. Is this what’s in store? Euthanasia with an awesome cognac induced alcoholic euphoria seems like a much better option.
A very pleasant flight. it’s well worth the extra to travel Premium Economy. Seats are so much more comfortable, more room, early boarding and disembarkation, great food and plenty of booze to keep you tranquillised.
Passport control was a breeze. No one was interested in the 1,001 covid documents I’d got to prove we didn’t need a plague bell round our necks.
The Ramada hotel was ok, but wouldn’t stay again. Next time we’ll stay at the Hyatt in the airport. That way no hanging around and chasing up hotel shuttle. It’s only money!
By 19:00 we’re in bed.
Hopefully as we get older we’ll remember the magic moments – one of the most precious must be when Esther grabs hold of my hand and leads me to what she wants, usually sweets, biscuits, chocolate, to play with dolls or help with a jigsaw. Mind you not that she needs any help with jigsaws.
I suppose we’ll really miss the grandkids over the next 6 weeks.
Wear’s your mask?
Could do with that everywhere.
Airport security, wot airport security. It’s a joke.
When I tried to check in online they kindly informed me and any Jihadi from the religion of pieces and a permanent offence that I would be subject to extra security screening. Such nice people to help the terrorist.
Then when I boarded they pulled me aside to check my computers etc. Selected at random apparently. Not the common sense option of being profiled. I’ve no problem with security, that’s what I pay for and expect, but this is just gross negligence, worshiping at the shrine of political correctness. I’m a 72-year-old white geriatric, how much of a risk must I pose. Meanwhile a potential terrorist can saunter on board because some self-righteous, woke, snowflakes don’t want to offend. It’s crazy. Their stupidity is putting my life at risk. It’s a disgusting waste and threat.
Wednesday
Wake up before the crack of sparrows. Typical hotel breakfast, complete with DIY waffles – a sure sign we’ve arrived in the good old USA. A land of plenty. Plenty of open spaces; plenty of friendly happy people; plenty of junk food options; plenty of spacious, slanted parking spaces; plenty of free wifi; plenty of free coffee; plenty of sunshine; plenty of free Pickleball; plenty of people who take a pride in their country, their flag and their military; plenty of state parks and national parks; plenty of sugar in nearly all foods; plenty of time idling at red traffic lights and of course plenty of everything bigger.
Our dock on Cow Creek.
Set off to pick up my car from the airport. After 20 years with Hertz I’m going over to the dark side with Avis. Hertz have just got way too expensive and have done so many dodgy things during the pandemic. First impression with Avis are good, including a great free upgrade.
Set off to Hudson. We’ve plenty of time before check-in so call off at Best Buy to look at a new iPad, then it’s the liquor store for some wine and Wendy’s favourite cheap E&J XO brandy – 1.75 litres for $31 – should be enough to keep her going for a week or two. Luckily she prefers this to any of the more expensive tipples.
Get into our home for the next 10 days, it’s awesome – see pictures. And also comes fully equipped with three kayaks and two bikes and also jigsaws for the real sado’s. We order two new jigsaws one of the US National parks and one of the US States. They will help us plan our road trip to visit all the 7 remaining states and numerous National Parks, plus help improve Wendy’s knowledge of the geography of the USA.
Then it’s the dreaded supermarket trip. With Wendy’s bad back I have to push the trolley. It’s just purgatory watching how she shops, reading all the labels; random backwards and forward-searching like Victor our robot vacuum cleaner; groping all the fruits and soft stuff. By the end of this I’ve lost the will to live. One ray of sunshine, I get a pack of 6 White Castles. NOW I KNOW I’M HOME.
Which of the 3 bedrooms should we choose?
Well the one business not to invest in over here is Covid mask sales. The majority don’t seem to bother wearing a mask – obviously Republicans. What’s really amazing is how many of the frail, geriatrics who struggle to lift a packet of crisps off the shelves and look ready to peg out at any moment don’t bother to wear a mask. Obvious targets for the grim reaper.
Back home for afternoon tea around the pool looking out onto cow creek and sunset.
Evening in watching Disney and a welcome bottle of Zinfanfandel.
Now I know I’m home.
The sooner he goes the better. There are more important things to get on with.
Thursday
One of three bathrooms.
The usual lazy start to our day with coffee and sadly newspapers. Why am I such a sucker for the news? Especially Apple News which provides a selection of all the UK and US news. They’re nothing but sensational scare mongers.
We then toddle off down to Hudson beach. Alas not much of it, leaves a lot to be desired. Festooned with blobby geriatrics on their recliners. Follow that with a visit to the local state park. Werner something or other. No wonder it was free.
Back home for afternoon tea but not before some punishment with yet another supermarket sojourn.
2nd bedroom of 3.
Then drag a kayak out and manage to launch it from our dock without drowning.
Have a pleasant tootle out of the Cow Creek lagoon to the sea and then down the local waterways. What a weird neighbourhood, mixture of lovely houses with an excess of trailers, shacks and shanties as you move further away from the sea. Some look like they’ve never had a lick of paint since the American civil war.
Yeah, White Castles for tea.
Lazy night in. Still pretty tired and struggle to stay awake. Mind the wine doesn’t help.
Judging by how few people wear masks you really wouldn’t think we’re in the middle of a pandemic. The attitude over here, including on all the signs on entrance doors, seems to be if you’re fully vaccinated then you’re totally immune, can’t spread it and don’t need to wear a mask. They’ve obviously not read the latest research on Omicron.
Friday
Drove up to Weeki Wachi, $13 entrance fee for just a stroll around – pass. Then onto the Week Wachi preserve for a free walk. Not very warm but pleasant enough.
Then on the way back we manage a couple of supermarkets, including Walmart, the one where all the crazy people go, followed by Aldi – not bigger or better than UK stores.
Kayaking on Cow Creek. Wot no alligators!
Off for the early bird special at the Inn on the Creek. Wendy’s decided that any fish dinners will be dining out or a takeaway. We’re there with all maskless golden oldies, shuffling in for the 5 o’clock specials. Depressing, when, despite having the mind of a 16-year-old, we realise we’re in that age group.
Back home for some TV.
In your dreams.
Saturday day
Fortunately don’t think I’ll meet the Mother-in-law when out kayaking.
Well I see they’ve not got rid of Boris yet. Wendy lives in hope.
After much research finally tracked down an 11″ iPad Pro. Looks like I’m going to have to splash out on the Pro version because Wendy doesn’t want the basic iPad, screens 0.8″ too small. Only having to upgrade because Wendy can’t look after her iPad, it has an hairline crack on the screen. Oh well every cloud has a silver lining. Try and order online at Best Buy, no chance can’t cope with UK telephone numbers or zip code so can’t get my credit card accepted. Do they not want International trade. It’s over £100 cheaper here – rip off Britain once again – so we tootle off down to Clearwater to pick one up.
Hopefully will see a few of these from the kayak.
We were going to go for a stroll but Wendy thinks it’s too cold.
Highway 19 is the main road up and down the coast, three lanes, with every possible business on either side plus an excess of signs for law firms.
Had a long chat with an American friend who is a nurse. She relates how over 90% of those in hospital with Covid are unvaccinated, the majority are in total denial it exists and won’t even help themselves.
Afternoon tea and jigsaw. Yes, they’ve got jigsaws in the house so us sad people can knuckle down.
Amazing that there’s always a long queue / line at Dunkin Donuts. No wonder there’s an excess of adipose tissue shuffling around.
Sunday
Werner Boyce state park.
Set up my new iPad. Wow the M1 chip is fast, just what a nerdy power user needs. Wendy gets my old iPad, and the new key pad turns mine into a desktop.
After a lazy start again we head off up to Homosa Springs. Turns out it’s also a wildlife park / zoo. Have a stroll around, lots of Manatees. How come you never see an emancipated Manatee? It’s a tad cold and Wendy does nothing but bitch about the cold.
After research decide it will be cheaper to buy an annual family state park pass. What a pantomime that turns out to be. Give the cashier my credit card. “No won’t accept”, give her Wendy’s card the same dumb response. Give her my debit card “Sorry no it’s not accepting that either, something about no pin”. Turns out she’s just not aware of chip and pin. Give her my credit card back and enter PIN, payment goes through. Meanwhile, a queue of seething Americans has built up. Then to add insult to injury I have to sign a credit card slip. They just don’t get chip and PIN, mind you she wasn’t the sharpest knife in the box.
The local gun range is open but sadly is not renting out guns due to Covid. Incredible considering the level of Covid denial and assault on their freedom.
Monday
Beautiful gentle giants. When you’re diving they come face up to you and love you to scratch the algae off their bellies.
Off to play pickle ball in the morning at an indoor leisure center. Can you believe it’s FREE – only in America. Get a good two hours playing in, about 640 calories, that equals a bottle of red wine. I can play pickle ball every day, mainly free, and can you believe it but I can start at 06:00 in the morning if I’m so demented. Only in America.
A tad cool but sunny. Ideal weather for a stroll around Werner Boyce Springs state park. Got to milk our annual state park pass for all it’s worth.
Wow, a day without a trip to the supermarket. Wendy will be getting withdrawal symptoms.
A great all-American steak for tea.
More jigsaw and TV.
More good news on the benefit of red wine to add to my scrap book of positive news. Drinking red wine can reduce risk of catching Covid, according to new research.
Here’s hoping he’s gone.
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on 20220118 – Back to America at Last
Off down to Pathos harbour this afternoon. A pleasant stroll around and even splashed out on a visit to the castle. Special geriatric rates only e2.50 for both of us.
Then it’s a stroll along the seafront and shops followed by an awesome double espresso.
And Wendy gets a special treat with a trip to Lidl.
In the evening we’re off out for dinner at our favorite Tavern. Great food and great service all topped off with a couple of pints of EKO lager. Quite a palatable local lager and their brandy’s not too bad either, a lovely mellow caramel taste, so much more palatable than Metaxa. Can you believe it, only e9.95 for a litre.
Then it back home in the pouring rain. Forecast wrong again.
The Cypriot Mouflon, otherwise known here in Cyprus as the Agrino (grεek: Αγρινό), is a wild sheep that is found only in Cyprus in the Paphos forest area. It is believed that the Mouflon first came to Cyprus around 8000 B.C. Interesting fact about our mouflons is that due to the near extinction of these wild sheeps from hunting, hunting of Cypriot mouflons has been banned in the island since 1930.
Characteristics of the Cypriot Mouflon are short hair, reddish to dark brown colour hair with dark black stripes on saddle area. Males have horns and females are either horned or polled, meaning without horns. In mature Mouflons the horns are actually almost fully curled into a circle. The males usually weight around 50kg and the females around 35kg.
This graphic just about sums up how awesome the messengerRNA (Pfizer and Moderna) really is. It is amazing how this vaccine gets into our own cells and uses them to manufacture proteins that invoke an immune response.
Thursday
OMG waking up to wet legs. Have I peed the bed? Is this the final indignity of being a geriatric? Oh, thanks be, it’s a leak in the ceiling dripping on the bed. What a relief. We’ve just had a downpour, raining harder than a cow pissing on a flat rock, enough to help launch an ark, and all that deluge onto a flat roof. Man the waste paper buckets. The joys of travel.
Lazy morning and then the excitement of the day is a walk up to the supermarket and back the long way round. Fortunately, yet again the weather forecast of rain all day is wrong, by 10:00 it’s back to normal, sun and cloud 21C – mainly sun.
Well, it may be Thanksgiving in America with turkey and all the trimming. Here it’s baked beans, sausage and Bury black puddings.
It’s coming to something when the highlight of the day is wet legs in bed. Still better than freezing to death in Belthorn.
Friday
Another gorgeous sunny day.
Highlight today is a drive up to Agios Georgios. Impressive church and small harbour. Take a stroll down to the harbour and back for our daily exercise. Then it’s an espresso overlooking the harbour.
Still no sign of the Mouflon.
Tea in again tonight.
An old one from Pat Condell on immigration but still so true:
Saturday
Well looks like we’ve dipped out on the snow in Belthorn. Oh dear, how sad. It’s gorgeous here again.
So far not a glimmer of a Mouflon sighting. Never mind Pafos zoo has one, that will do.
Of we troop to the zoo. Hang on we’ve no kids with us, will they let us in. Perhaps we’ll be able to rent a child at the entrance. Actually surprised how many elderly people with no rug rats there are in the zoo.
Cash only to get in despite the credit card signs. “Sorry but there’s no internet for the card machine” as she points to the adjacent cash machine, which also must use the Internet. Never mind it’s an opportunity to get rid of some of those Euro coins in the car. We return with about 50 coins to pay. When she sees all those coins she’s got to count out the internet is miraculously restored. “No it’s ok we’re glad to get rid of all these coins”. With a wince and grimace she starts counting.
Goats, perhaps the closest we’re going to get to seeing the elusive Muflonn.
It’s a sad old zoo with small cages and a lot of them with only one animal or bird in. Pass on the 5 euro opportunity to hand feed the lonely giraffe and the sole elephant is a disturbing sight.
A tortoise is trying to mount another. She must have a headache, she’s having none of it. But no he keeps following and noisily banging into her, shell on shell. Meanwhile, the big alpha blue-nosed male baboon is preening his penis, looking for fleas and seeing how far he can stretch it, all the while his female partner is picking fleas out of his backside. One of the tigers seems to want to mount another. Sex seems to be a common theme to kill the boredom, either that or just pacing up and down. Oh so sad.
One of the monkeys turns to pee on Wendy – the highlight of his day no doubt. Whilst the two Kuckaboroos are sent into an orgasmic frency when I play my Kuckaborough ring tone for them. Sad really as their cage is oh so small.
Go to watch the 30-minute bird show. Surprised it’s all in English. Everyone is warned that there is a 300 euro fine if not wearing a mask properly. Should try that on a Jet2 flight, they’d raise a fortune.
A sad couple of hours really. This is not how zoos should be. And to top it all they don’t have a Mouflon.
Out for dinner tonight and it’s a fish platter. Including Muscles (fightneing), Prawns, Shark steaks, Squid (liked it), Octopus (really liked it), Whitebait, cod and sea bream. We’re stuffed by the end of it. Wendy sticks with Prawn, Cod and Sea Bream – no sense of adventure.
Equally awesome is the Astra-Zeneca vaccine. Until I’d watch this youtube I didn’t realise how similar to the messengerRNA vaccines it was. Amazing how our scientist create these solutions.
Shops are to be allowed to sell products in pounds and ounces again after the government pledged to review a ban on marking and selling products in imperial units as part of post-Brexit changes to EU laws.
While it is very unlikely that imperial weights and measures will ever return in science and industry, imperial does have a lot of uses in the classroom, in that units are fraction based, not decimal point-based, which gives teachers opportunities to introduce fractions and fractional maths into the curriculum earlier, and allows children to better understand them. It also introduces the concept of different numeration systems, which in itself is useful, leading the pupil into concepts like binary, octal, hexadecimal and other complex number systems, all of which are essential to budding scientists and technologists.
Sunday
Another one of those weird trees. Is there a vortex there? Is it male or female.
The press are having an extravaganza of scaremongering with the threat of the Omicron Covid strain. Apparently it more transmissible than Delta. But truth be known no one really has a clue. No mention at all of the theory that viri tend to mutate to become more transmissible but less lethal, despite doctors from South Africa saying that it would appear to have more mild symptoms – that won’t sell newspapers.
Never mind, for once our donkey leaders are on the ball, and have put African countries into the red zone. And the rest of us will now have to take a day 2 PCR test when we land, rather than the easier and cheaper lateral flow test. I suppose the PCR test makes sense as they can assumedly track any of the new strain.
Fortunately, I’ve not booked my lateral flow test yet so book a PCR test instead. We’ll have to self isolate until we get a negative result – about 48 hours.
And the good news is they’ve introduced mask wearing on transport and in shops. You know it makes sense, even if it’s not until Tuesday. I’ve no doubt it’ll be ignored by the members of the SSS.
Another sunny day and lazy morning, although a tad humid. It’s getting hotter 24C. Have a stroll down to the beach. Not really very nice, with muddy brown sand, but not a problem as we’re not “beach people”. Decide to sin and go on the lash with a pint of lager sat outside a bar overlooking the sea. Sadly no eye candy on the beach.
A night in watching Borgen a Danish “House of Cards”.
The snowflakes strike again.
A WHO source confirmed the letters Nu and Xi of the Greek alphabet had been deliberately avoided for this new mutation. Nu had been skipped to avoid confusion with the word ‘new’ and Xi had been skipped to ‘avoid stigmatising a region’. Xi is the name of the leader of the country that gave us Covid in the first place. Seems to me it would have been most appropriate to call it Xi, just to remind us where it all came from.
Monday
Another warm sunny day. Although a tad windy down by Pathos harbour.
Today’s excursion is to Kato Paphos Archaeological Park, or as Wendy described it a 2nd century BC Wimpey housing estate. Another World Heritage site. Time for a bit more culture. A pleasant 2 mile walk around and Wendy stops for her butty sat overlooking what Wendy describes as a pile of rocks.
This mosaic represents the story of Icarios. Dionysos and the half naked Acme are depicted to the left of the panel. In the centre, Icarios is seen holding the reins of an oxe driven cart, filled with sacks of wine. Further to the right, there are two shepards pissed as newts. A sign says they are “the first wine drinkers”.
The nice thing about Cyprus at this time of year is there’s plenty of parking and best of all it’s free.
Stop off afterwards for my new tradition of an afternoon espresso.
Then it’s back home for afternoon tea sat out in the sun.
Of course the day wouldn’t quite be complete without a trip to the local supermarket for what is hopefully the last time.
Awesome pizza, from Lidl, with potatoes on it. Then settle in for the night watching Borgen a Danish version of House of Cards / Madame Secretary. A great series.
Tuesday
More archeology.
The first task today is an hour’s admin getting our Passenger Locator Forms and Boarding Passes. Since when did I sign up for all these secretarial duties, answering inane web-based questions. Along with text message authorisation codes galore – seems to be the new craze amongst the 10-year-old nerds who design these websites. There was a time when all these things were done for you as part of customer service. Now they’ve been shunted onto the poor customer.
They don’t build them like that anymore.
Wendy takes great delight in reminding me of my system designs when I worked to introduce more web-based automation, perhaps it’s karma and payback time.
A sun and cloud day. Oscillate between sitting out for 30 minutes then back in to escape the sun.
Wednesday
Wow, seas a tad rough today.
Well it’s our last day and still no Mouflon. Bitterly disappointed.
We don’t have to be out until 11:00 so it’s a leisurely start.
We’re at the airport by 12:00 and typical Jet2 check-in doesn’t open until 3 hours before the flight so we have to hang around until 13:45.
Our street. A great place to stay if ever we come again.
Check-in, passport control and the usual scan and body search chaos are over with quickly with very little hassle. But, when you think about it, 20 years since 9/11 and some 6th century, rag-headed barbarian is still inflicting all this check-in chaos on us. You would have thought by now we would have a better solution.
Well what did we think of Cyprus:
A great VRBO with awesome views.
A great location, very quiet, upmarket and peaceful, yet only 5 minutes walk to the strip with a great choice of resaurants.
Very relaxing. Not a lot to do as we’ve been to most of the tourist attractions before, but enough. Very little driving.
Great weather warm and sunny. Just a couple of short periods of rain in morning, which had zero effect on usas we don’t rush around in the mornings.
Would we come again? Yes.
The only downside is not being able to flush toilet paper, instead, you have to put it in a bin. Disgusting, takes some getting used to. After two weeks no doubt when we get home we’ll still be putting it in the bin.
The snowflakes are at it again.
UK government holds up ‘Don’t take Covid home for Christmas’ ads: Don’t mention Christmas to avoid offending Muslims
“We have been advised by Cabinet Office that we should not use the word Christmas – as the Government campaign needs to be inclusive and some religions don’t celebrate Christmas.”
Right. But there’s really only one religion that would be offended by the prospect of the majority culture celebrating or even noting its own traditions. The principle is always and everywhere the same: in Muslim countries, you must conform your behavior to Muslim sensibilities. And in non-Muslim countries, you must conform your behavior to Muslim sensibilities.
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on 20211124 – Cyprus, In Search Of The Mouflon
We’re all aboard the Covid Express to Cyprus courtesy of Jet2. Fly with us they say we’re taking precautions and caring for you. Everyone on board must wear masks.
Apart from the SS (Stupid and Selfish), it was a pretty good flight. Being sat at the back we thought we’d be last off but they disembark from front and rear row by row. We’re through Cyprus Covid Pass check and customs within minutes. Spoilt by a 20-minute wait for luggage.
Hertz is a 10-minute bureaucratic and paperwork extravaganza, and oh £28 extra as we’re geriatrics – Mr Hertz and I will be discussing age discrimination in due course. But, Presidents Circle membership, gets Wendy to drive free and they’ve upgraded us by about 5 levels to a fairly new superb Kia Stonic SUV. What is it with Hertz in the EU, are they trying to suck up to the EU by showing how bureaucratic they can be? Love Hertz in America, you just walk up and select any car from the Presidents Circle bay.
Apple maps can’t seem to cope in Cyprus so we have to resort to Google maps. What a nightmare of a journey, in the dark, down every side road. I’m amazed we didn’t have to open any gates and cross a few fields. What the hell is Google maps up to? have they gone Climate Change mad and tried to find the shortest route rather than straight up the main coast road. Give me Apple maps any day.
Finally, arrive and set off on foot and torch to find our villa.
Settle in, then a quick, well not really, nip to the supermarket for tomorrow’s breakfast and a few beers. Wow, they sell Hofbrau Original.
Settle in and then off out for dinner. As we’re not going on a cruise, which Wendy loves because she doesn’t have to cook, I’ve said we’ll eat out every night. It’s a five-minute walk up to the main strip with oodles of restaurants to choose from. Wow, service. We read the outdoor menu and they come dashing out to greet us. We finally decide and the doors opened for us and we’re ushered to our table. We both settle for the Cyprus Platter, macaroni dish, kleftiko, keftedes and salad, all washed down by a local beer served in a barrel glass at my request. It’s awesome, I could easily live on this for a fortnight.
Home to bed.
Grateful for being able to escape the British winter for some summer sun.
If you ever want to understand why the UK has problems with Covid then take a Jet2 flight. It’s full of the new age SS, the Stupid and Selfish, who look for every opportunity to flaunt or not wear their masks. A great example on boarding is the woman in an aisle seat who takes her mask off to have a good cough. Then there’s a woman a row in front coughing her guts up, no mask. I complain to the steward who does nothing about it other than making yet another announcement that they all ignore. Perhaps no one speaks English so they don’t understand.
Amazing isn’t it, if you’re not wearing your seatbelt they’ll threaten and berate you, but are scared shitless of politely asking people to wear their masks. Have the stewards not figured that it’s their health at risk, whereas with the seatbelt it’s only the passenger who may die. Why they don’t even do anything when a passenger walks up to them with no mask on. As for don’t queue in the isles for the toilet. No chance. The Stewards even battle their way through the queue, rather than ask them to sit back down. No wonder Covid is rife.
Thursday
Lazy start with breakfast on the patio, sat in the sun enjoying the sea view. This is the life.
Laze around all morning, settling in and browsing the internet.
Then it’s that dreaded trip to the supermarket. We’ve decided we’re mainly eating out but still need some home basics and for the occasional meals in. Set off to the nearest hypermarket. This is the supermarket from hell. Needs a Euro to get a trolley, we don’t have any coins with us but kindly customer services lady lends us one. Narrow aisle and with what has to be the weirdest layout of all supermarkets takes ages to find things. Full of old dears blocking the aisle with their trolleys. OMG it’s so slow. Keep losing Wendy and spend half the time searching for her. Wendy was right, the smaller supermarket from last night was better. You lives and you learns, hopefully. It’s only saving grace is they sell Lowenbrau.
If men did the shopping then there’d be a World Wide Standard for supermarket layout. Perhaps something useful the EU could arrange, in place of all their useless bureaucracy, especially GDPR and other useless data protection.
It’s a tad ungodly driving over here, you’re in a foreign country so you expect to be on the wrong side of the road. Yet here in Cyprus, like the UK, they drive on the correct side of the road, and all their signs etc follow UK convention, including even the infamous beletia beacon zebra crossing. Not only that but they also have the worlds most sensible electric plug. Yes, you guessed it, the UK plug. None of your wobbly, sparking and floppy designs that can zap your fingers.
Back home and then off for a stroll along the lovely path at the bottom of our garden. The gardens along the path are lovely and pristine, as are the gardens of all the superb homes. Well as for the beach and sea at the bottom of our garden I was right, but there’s just one tiny snag in the form of a 50-foot cliff down onto a rock-strewn beach. Still not a problem as we hardly ever go on a beach.
Our home for the fortnight is lovely and comfortable, well equipped, with lovely gardens, patios, pool and outdoor seating. Just right for two people or even 4 at a pinch.
Temperature is about 23 of them Evil Union degrees and mainly sun and cloud. Just right. Don’t think we’d survive here in the summer. Lots of lovely homes and gardens but the majority are empty. For us, this is the ideal time of year.
Big debate whether to eat out tonight. Decide on Wayu cheese burgers at home. Try the bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon, very lush and fruity. But, it still doesn’t agree with me. There’s half a bottle left that is used to clean the drains.
“The art of the croissant” from the bakery chain Paul claims one very French habit is to dunk your croissant briefly in your favourite hot drink – we recommend a nice milky coffee – before each bite.”
What is wrong with Donkey Boris and Donkey Preti, that even a half brained cocker spaniel can comprehend. If France was serious about solving the illegal immigrant problem and earning their £54M then it’s simple, they would just let us send them back to France. It wouldn’t be long before the illegals got the message. But let’s face it they want to be shut of them.
It is oh so simple. The French are just taking these two donkeys for patsies. Stop giving the French money and find a shithole of a country to send the illegals to for processing. Get the new laws passed as a priority and if you came here illegally then off to the shithole to be told you’re not entitled to asylum. Plenty of photos and publicity of life in the shithole. Problem solved within days.
Why the French have even told us they are not working to a 100% prevention of channel crossings.
Meanwhile, let’s realise that the Evil Union is in an economic war with us. They are not our friends.
Time for ACTION THIS DAY as Churchill would have said.
Friday
Another lazy start to a warm, sun and cloud day. Breakfast on the patio again. I could really get used to this lifestyle. Perhaps we should start to think about wintering here.
After Wendy’s usual lunch we drive down to the few beaches around Coral Bay and take a pleasant stroll around each. Sadly no topless beaches here to entertain me.
Despite the weather forecast of sun and cloud it turns out to be a lovely sunny day, just right, not too hot.
It’s a trip to the Japanese restaurant for tonight’s tea. Greeted by a grunting female with all personality, charm and enthusiasm of a tortoise with a toothache. I think she’s had a lobotomy to have her personality removed. Sushi starters, including Octopus, followed by a Tepanaki seafood extravanganza, with all the usual theatricals associated with Tenpanaki. At least this guy has a personality.
What is wrong with Virgin Atlantic, to give you a clue let’s take a look at my recent sorry encounter with them:
1 Over 90 minutes for them to answer the phone. After 18 months of Covid they are still using Covid as a pathetic excuse for such shameful service levels. The management should be ashamed, they have the golden opportunity to use remote home workers. It’s either shoddy management or just an excuse to cut costs.
2 Not content with my membership of Virgin Atlantic Flying club they now introduce yet another club to help them squander and reject their useless flying club points. Hey, we CUSTOMERS just want a simple life and to be able to use our points instead of £’s. We don’t need yet another CLUB, sort out internally the one you have to deal with all aspects. To add insult to injury you need a separate login to remember and, you guessed it, yet another password – all I need in this world of password hell. Bizarrely the login consists of four words, perhaps “dont-care-clue-less” would be appropriate. Do they not realise that we all have a unique identifier that they already request in their account details. It’s called an email address and if your witless IT department can’t figure out how to use it as a login id then give me a call and for a significant fee I’ll help them. What a double win that would be, something unique that everyone can easily remember and one less question on your account details sign up.
3 Virgin Atlantic Flying club requires a 10, or was it the old 11 digit user id, that’s if you can get past the technical glitch. Again what’s wrong with our unique email address – see 2 above. Make the CUSTOMERS life simple – we pay your wages.
4 Rather than 90 minutes on the phone I contact Virgin Red via their web page to request details of how many club points to upgrade a particular flight. Good old Sally P (Virgin Red) gets back to me to tell me “This is a question for Virgin Atlantic Flying Club. If you pop them an email to customer.services@fly.virgin.com they will be able to assist you with this.”. I don’t suppose it ever occurred to her she could pull her finger out and answer the question herself or even send my request to them. Thank you Sally from Virgin Red MEMBER SUPPORT.
5 I send my request to “CUSTOMER SERVICES”. They at least tell me “You would be looking at around 23,700 points…”. I already knew this from their website, but don’t know the actuals for my flight or whether there are any seats available. They then go onto to say “We’re not able to check availability or upgrade the ticket here but you can contact our Customer Service team via SMS, WhatsApp or over the phone, and a member of the team will be more than happy to look into this for you.”. Again I don’t suppose it ever occurred to him he could make the supreme effort and answer the problem himself or even send my request to them. Oh, there’s me thinking I’m a CUSTOMER dealing with CUSTOMER SERVICES, but wrong you’re dealing “Leah B Virgin Atlantic Customer Centre”. Yet another sloppy round-shouldered department within Virgin Atlantic who are equally clueless as to the concept of customer services.
6 Well it’s raining and I like a challenge so I go to the web page suggested by Leah, and not a whiff of how to get in touch via Whatsapp. Never mind I battle on, track down their telephone number and figure out how to use Whatsapp to get in touch. About 7 WhatsApp questions later and I’m shown a link to a form where I can yet again, for the umpteenth time, enter my original request.
It seems that the only sensible solution is to grin and bear 90 minutes of Virgin’s awful music on hold and hopefully talk to a sentient being with a brain and the desire to actually help. Sadly no doubt at the end of this sorry tale it will be the usual answer that we can’t use our points on this flight even though there are seats available. They’re just a rip-off.
By now you’re probably wondering why I bother flying Virgin Atlantic. Well, that’s simple, it’s a great comfortable flight and the front line cabin crew are awesome, have superb customer care skills, are pleasant, obviously really enjoy their job and have such a positive mental attitude. Unlike the jobsworths that infest and loiter around the back-office functions.
So, Dickie if you can be bothered listening, perhaps you can get me an answer? In the meantime here’s my free advice to you. Dish out some brown envelopes to the indolents in CUSTOMER CARE management and replace them with some of the cabin crew who really understand customer care.
Saturday
It’s forecast thunder, lightning and rain for most of the day. All stops around dinner time and it’s a glorious sunny afternoon.
After a leisurely morning hunkered down watching the rain. We take a stroll up to “The Strip” to explore all the restaurants available. It’s your typical Brit abroad place, plenty of bars with English booze, English football, pub food – why do these people bother to come abroad, they could stay at home a lot cheaper. Fortunately, amidst these Brit bars, there are many tempting Greek restaurants.
Then it’s off to the local supermarket for a top-up of basic supplies, water and beer. As usual Wendy’s quite right this supermarket is so much better than the giant hell hole we went to the other day. Amazing how much English food they have, even Bury black puddings, and awesome they not only have Hofbrau Original but also Paulaner.
Back home for afternoon tea and for Wendy scones, while sat in our sunny alcove.
Sunday
Lazy start as usual.
After Wendy’s usual lunch, today’s little excursion was to the Dead Centre of Paphos, the Tomb of Kings. Yet another World Heritage site.
So there you are some third century BC clay tablet billionaire, politician, or political lickspittle and you sign up for the co-op‘s premium platinum burial plan in the hope for a superb final resting place and burial plot, along with a few amphorae of wine for the journey to the afterlife. Alas, your plans for all eternity are snookered as along comes some geezers from UNESCO to relocate your body and turn your expensive burial plot into a tourist attraction. Just another one of life‘s or death’s little tribulations. If that was me I’d want my money back.
Wow, Wendy spots a Lidl. She just can’t resist and funnily enough, now she’s decided she’s not so keen on going out for dinner every night, rather eat in. Anyone spot the reasoning?
Tea in and an alcohol free day. End of another sunny day.
What a nightmare car hire has become. Hertz, my preferred supplier, oh so easy to deal with and has good SLI and CDW as standard, have gone through the roof with pricing. £80 to £100 a day for a small car. The other car hire companies are a nightmare of weasely SLI and CDW terms and conditions, you need a Philadelphia lawyer to interpret them. Found Turo, a peer-to-peer car sharing app, like Airbnb for cars, makes so much sense but by the time you’ve put their sensible level of SLI and CDW in place they’re as expensive as the rest. Would be a great alternative if only the excess insurance companies would cover them.
Monday
Start of another glorious sunny day.
After lunch, it’s a stroll along the rocky beach and then around the neighbourhood. We really have picked an ideal spot, great sea views, lovely garden, upmarket, quiet and peaceful neighbourhood yet just 5 minutes stroll to the strip for restaurants and shops. A good supermarket, full of English goodies, is only 10 minutes stroll away.
Looks like we’re dining in tonight, now Wendy’s discovered a Lidl. Have to say having a home rental is a real home from home, so much preferable to hotel, cruise or even caravan, although Wendy would disagree with the latter.
Breakfast in glorious sunshine, on the patio, watching a hawk hover over the cliff tops in search of breakfast. How good can life get. I can’t ever remember having breakfast on the patio in Belthorn. Come to think of it why do we even bother with a patio.
I see scientists have done a major meta-analysis of all the research and come up with the result that wearing a face mask gives you 53% protection from Covid. Yet the SSS (Stupid, Selfish, Snowflakes) still can’t get it. To save you the trouble of reading it, in the hope that common sense will prevail, here is a summary of the findings. “Results from more than 30 studies from around the world were analysed in detail, showing a statistically significant 53% reduction in the incidence of Covid with mask-wearing and a 25% reduction with physical distancing. Handwashing also indicated a substantial 53% reduction in Covid incidence…”.
Tuesday
Lazy morning again.
Glorious sunshine so we drive up to Pegeia, a place we stayed back in 2008. We were planing on a walk around but there’s not really much there and Coral Bay is so much better. Drive down to the sea caves, yes we’ve been there before but can’t really remember much, but we have photos. Have a pleasant stroll around, all very picturesque. Time for more photos.
Then it’s a supermarket top-up visit, followed by back home for afternoon tea around the pool. Wow, we lead an exciting life.
Tea in tonoght and more exciting TV. Finish off the bottle of merlot from last night. Think I’ll give up buying or drinking wine in Cyprus, a bottle of vinegar is much cheaper.
Another pleasant breakfast in glorious sunshine on the patio watching our local hawk hover over the clifftops in search of breakfast. Then it’s attacked by some black bird of unkown breeding, entertaining aerial combat ensues. Blackbird sees off the hawk.
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We get a late checkout so it’s a leisurely morning packing etc.
Drive down to our next abode, Marseillan a small town in Herault between Montpeiller and Perpignan, for a week. It’s less than two hours drive. Call off at a Super U to pick up some Coteaux de Aix en Provence. A gorgeous sunny day and we’re arrive by 15:00. Fortunately, no problem getting in early.
New VRBO is lovely, looks very comfortable.
Settle down to an afternoon tea on the patio. Then it’s off to the obligatory supermarket. Not just any supermarket but a Hypermarket, you could get lost in here for days, like Costco but more choice.
Back home for Baked beans and sausage for tea. Easily pleased, just give me baked beans. Soon get set up and enjoy an alcohol-free night, no escaping TV with a snooze.
Langudoc region is not on my favourite list for wine. Can only think of two appellations I want to try, Carbards and Pic St Loup. Both are reckoned to be fruity. We’ll see.
What a pleasure it can be driving down the country roads of France. Down Frances many very own many dark Hedges, although not so dark, just lined with beautiful trees on both sides. Then driving through the vineyards and pondering all that lovely wine they produce. Just an awesome, short trip to our next VRBO home in Marseillan.
Climate change catastrophe:
Sunday
Wow that beds comfortable.
We have our usual lazy first day. Which roughly translates into the same as any other day but no driving.
After lunch set off for a stroll into town and to the harbour. I think the whole of France must be here, troughing away, not a sandwich in sight. Settle down into a sumptuous settee on the harbourside for some drinks. A beer for me – forgive for I have sinned – and a pina colada for Wendy. Sadly the beer is served in a girly flower vase, a sure way to catch a cold, it’s that girly and ornate I’ll even probably catch pneumonia. Gorgeous sat in the brilliant sunshine people watching. Time for a second round – encore un verre – even Wendy has another pina colada. At this rate, she may need carrying home, most unusual.
Back home for afternoon tea on the patio and sit out in the sun loungers. After 20 minutes I’ve had enough of sun lounging.
Time for a nap.
Here’s a classic, one of Pat Condell’s first YouTube rants on Islam:
Monday
Patio by moonlight.
Another glorious sunny day. I take a stroll down to the local supermarket for my bread, it’s the holy trinity of the table tonight.
After a lazy morning and lunch, we decide on a drive down to Marseillan Plage. Well, what a disappointment that was. Nothing is really there as everything is closed up. Marseillan is so much nicer with its lovely port, bars and restaurants. We have a stroll around to get in our daily exercise and then decide to head back home. Pass on the idea of a drive to Sete, we’ll save that for another day. This is really going to be a laid back week with minimal driving.
Wendy finally sees the benefits of two weeks in Cyprus in December to break up our 2.5 months in the frozen wastelands of Belthorn. I’d offered an all-inclusive option so that Wendy could have a real break, but we both agree it is so much better in a VRBO where you have a nice house and grounds at your disposal, rather than crammed in a bedroom. We’ll go for the VRBO option and dine out every night. We spend the evening selecting a VRBO and find plenty to choose from. Select a 3 bedroom, with pool, more balconies than we’d know what to do with and sea views.
A host of words are banned in the Commons, some of them seemingly more innocuous than others. “Blackguard”, “pipsqueak” and “pecksniffian” are said to be some of the words that can get MPs thrown out of the Commons.
Perhaps it’s time to bring that into common use.
How can you drink a beer out of this flower vase. Sure way to get a cold.
Tuesday
Lazy start to a brilliant sunny day.
Book our flights and car hire to Cyprus, it’s Jet2 and Hertz. Jet2 takes at least 30 minutes to wade through the complexities of their website, and many extras. The good news is you don’t have to pay to use the toilet – yet. Yeah, we’re all booked. Hang on a second Wendy wants lounge access at Manchester and Dragon Cards are no guarantee. Wendy gets lounge access. She’s still a bit perplexed why we can’t go Premium or Business class with Jet2, settle for emergency exit row seats. Knowing Jet2 they’ll probably charge us if we ever have to throw the door out in an emergency.
Have a drive down to Cap de Agde. Gorgeous beach and finally find a beach cafe for coffee. For once it seems we’ve found somewhere we’ve not been before. Strange because my memory of Cap de Agde was of dirty grey sand.
Then drive to the port at Agde, and yes we’ve been here before. More free parking. Have a pleasant stroll around the port, it’s quite busy and then roof down in the Thingimajigger and we’re off home for afternoon tea on the patio. Hang on a second we just have to nip into a supermarket – Wendy gets her daily fix.
Health and Safety French style. Great place for kid to play!
Wednesday
Another lazy day planned. Give coffee and sandwich a miss.
We decide we’re going for the full monty, Plat de Jour, French lunch, so we spend hours deliberating online which restaurant, which menu. Finally agree. Check online, yes it’s open. Of course, when we get there it’s closed. It’s France. Spend another 20 minutes trying to choose an alternative restaurant from the 6 on offer around the harbour. There was a queue 20 deep to get into one restaurant and waiters were buzzing around but not one could be bothered to show people to their tables. Why do the French put up with such sloppy, rude and lazy service? How do German visitors cope. The French have no consideration for the stress on their mental health?
Finally, settle on a restaurant. Rather than starve to death waiting for an invite we just plonk ourselves down. The waitress walks by the table at least 3 times when she could have just said hello, or even bonjour, and dropped a menu off. Oh no much too efficient.
Laidback! It takes 20 minutes just to place an order. The whole lunch takes 2 hours 3 minutes, oh my god I’ll be three minutes late for work.
I suppose if you get 2 hours for lunch you have to occupy it with something. So it’s either food, preferably slow to fill the two hours or sex, but then again I suppose sex is going to be over that quick that you’ll still have plenty of time for a slow lunch.
I’m bold, I’ll try anything once so try a plate of sea snails (I wondered why fish restaurants had escargot on the menu) to start, 3 oysters and then some Marlin with a glass of Pomerol – I’ve been conned, not very good, but turns out there’s a wine region down here called Pomerol, nowhere near as good as the Bordeaux version. Sea snails were hard work to winkle out and pretty tasteless, the oysters were done in a cheese sauce which was very tasty, probably a good job as I’m sure the Oysters had no taste, the Marlin was delicious. Will I wake up dead tomorrow? I think plenty of alcohol tonight might help me survive.
I think we’ll pass on the Plat de Jour experience in future, it’s just too stressful watching the slothful and sloppy service.
Back home for an Armagnac to finish off the meal and a refreshing cup of afternoon tea.
Vote for me. It is magnificent. It is the war.
Just trying to book hotels on our way home. I’ve come to the conclusion that the French obviously fast at weekend as nearly all the hotel restaurants are only open Monday to Friday. What a pity Germany doesn’t have good weather, that way we could go there instead of France.
Thursday
It’s forecast rain and clouds for today.
I know let’s drive up and have a look around Pezenas, I’m sure we’ve never been there, and the guidebook says it’s quaint. Well, you really shouldn’t rely on any guidebook that describes Beziers and Tarascon in favourable terms. Fortunately, the forecast is wrong, there’s glorious sunshine so it’s onto plan B. Drive down to Sete. Yes, we’ve been here before. Have a stroll around the many quaysides and settle for a coffee. Then Wendy gets her treat to wander around the shops, by now they’re open.
Drive back along the thin strand of the coast, top-down in glorious sunshine to the Hyper U at Agde. Sadly we need tonight and tomorrow night’s tea. Hardly anyone on checkout and plenty of long queues. Checkout girls are slower than a herd of turtles stampedin’ through peanut butter. Why do the French put up with this, yet another example of shoddy service.
Even Wendy loses her patience, so you can imagine how calm I am. She definitely couldn’t cope with living in France.
Thankfully that’ll be our last French supermarket for a few years.
A difrent perspective on all the hubris over climate change.
Or do you believe the fear mongering headline from that rag The Independent – “World heading for catastrophe without bolder climate plans, UN warns”.
Friday
A cloudy day in Marseillan.
Forecast for today is not good. Best, by the BBC is cloud and sun with 20% chance of rain, worst, by Watson (IBM AI) of the weather channel, is +50% chance of rain and no sun. The BBC are always best for an optimistic view and weather channel are always very pessimistic. I think overall the BBC is the most accurate.
So it’s a lazy day. Have a stroll down to the harbour, no rain but very windy.
Agde Port.
Mostly spend the day sorting out our mess with Kindle and Amazon. Boy is it complicated? We have four Amazon accounts linked to devices dating back to 2013. Amazon are no help with their online chat, manned by staff who speak English but as it’s not their native tongue they don’t really comprehend it – time they watched more British TV. Finally, figure it out and sort out our two Kindle online readers.
Tea tonight is fish again. This time not so risque. I’m having a Tuna steak and some Marlin, Wendy’s going for the safe Salmon option – she’d never get in the Girl Guides.
Well as for wine of the region I couldn’t find any Carbards but did manage to find 3 different Pic St Loup. Two of them were just about drinkable, but never to be tried again. As for the third well, I managed to force down the first glass, the rest was used as drain cleaner – started off mellow but with an awful, indescribable, after taste. Yes, another bottle of French wine poured down the drain – get me home to the Carmeneras, Zinfandels and Pinot Noir.
How binary works, a superb skit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9edtHJMaws0(
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on 20211023 – Marseillan? Somewhere on the South coast of France.
Luxury of a late departure – 12:00 – so lazy start and pack up. Good job really as it’s just over two hours to our next stay in Provence.
Our home for the next week.
Easy drive, autoroute all the way, so much more relaxing than British Motorways. Roadworks, what are they?
Lounge
Stop off for Wendy’s lunch.
Arrive about 15:00 and were met by our landlady who shows us around. Despite her limited English and my poor French, we get by.
Kitchen
Settle in with a cup of tea on the patio, it’s a gorgeous sunny day. The home and garden are lovely, all situated in a quiet small village, a welcome change from Cannes. Pool’s covered over for the winter, not a problem for me. Lovely patio area for coffee and meals, 3 electric bikes. Then it’s off to the supermarket. We’ve a choice of SuperU or Mosquitos (Intermarche). It’s a long while since we enjoyed the smell of Eau de Sewage from a SuperU, lets keep it that way, so Mosquitos it is. We’ve planned meals well up to Tuesday and trying to wean Wendy off too many supermarket visits.
Our patio.
The store’s massive and there seems little logic in layout, really is time for a worldwide standard on supermarket layout, would save so much time. Checkout seems to think we’re thieves, not CUSTOMERS, as they want to check the insides of our shopping bags. If it hadn’t taken us over an hour I’d have been for walking out and leaving the shopping in the trolley. Disgusting customer service, can you imagine that in England? Can only assume that there are a lot of thieves in France.
There are two checkout exits, so we choose the one nearest to us. Can you believe it, but that exit leads into a different car park, and the only way back to our car park is by a security guarded escort (in case we nick anything) back through the store – only in France.
Back home to get wifi, Apple TV and charging stations set up. Now we’re good to go with bread, wine and cheese for tea.
The wine seems to have it’s usual effect as I nod off with a glass in hand. What a waste, half a glass of wine, oh and broken glass – time to get my travel plastic wine glass out.
Grateful for having survived the traffic in Cannes. I think I’ll have a tee shirt printed – “We survived a week of traffic in Cannes”.
Enjoyed Cannes especially the views from our balcony and the coffees on the beach. They were memorable. But, dreaded driving in Cannes. Weather was great despite the gloom and doom weather forecasts.
Vikings, a mythology of peace
Well I thought we’d come across the Guiness Book of Records for longest password in Cannes, with 20 characters. But, no this will definitely end up in the Guiness book of records at 39 characters, consisting of lower case, numeric and special characters. The joke is that a lot of sites would reject this as it does not include any upper case letters. Perhaps they thought by keeping it lower case they were making it easy! Ridiculous. No chance of keying that in without a mistake. Only solution is to type it into Notes then copy and paste.
Thank the FSM for Apples share password feature.
Sunday
Lazy start to the day. We’ve decided to have a do-nothing day other than a stroll around Maillane. It’s a gorgeous sunny day again.
Come across a cafe on our stroll so stop off for a beer sat out in the sun. A bizarre cafe with a very limited choice of beer.
Back home for afternoon tea around the pool. Then it’s time for a beer and finish off the last of that coteaux d’aix en Provence. Sadly could only find one bottle in the supermarket.
Then it’s time to do battle with the oven. No where, including the manual and the Internet, can we find what those absurb symbols mean.
What is it with waiters who can avoid eye contact and ignore you. You’d think it would be in their interest to get the customer committed with an order, even if it’s going to take hours to deliver. Look after the customer for more business. Instead, let’s avoid the customer, he might spend more money, an interesting business model. Our waiter, who must have passed out summa cum laude in the subjects of “eye contact avoidance” and “shoddy service” at the World-renowned Paris School of waiting, was just lazy.
An example from one of the many coffee stops. A waiter acknowledges us with a nod, then comes out 4 times and still can’t be bothered to at least take our order. Hello, customer waiting. Goodbye, customer leaving.
Monday
Wow, another gorgeous sunny day.
Roof down in the Thingimajigger and we’re off on an adventure.
Drive down quiet, if somewhat dilapidated, country roads to L’isle sur la sorgue. We’ve been there before but it’s such a pleasant little town. Charming to walk around, but alas no chance of a sandwich, the French are out in force troughing, only 3 course French lunches available, so we have to settle for a coffee and tea. Whatever happened to sandwiches or even Croque Monsuer?
Bump into a Super U. Wow, after 20 years working and holidaying in France we finally get to visit a Super U supermarket that doesn’t stink of raw sewage. No longer need a gas mask. They must have gotten rid of their Eau de Sewage floor cleaner.
Then it’s off to Fontaine de Vaucluse, again we’ve been before, but still another lovely town to walk around. Wendy settles on an ice cream for lunch, coffee for me. Walk up to the source of the river but cannot see anything gushing out, must be underground.
The Fontaine de Vaucluse is a karst spring in the commune of Fontaine-de-Vaucluse, France. It is the largest karst spring in metropolitan France by flow and fifth largest in the world, with annual output of 630,000,000 to 700,000,000 cubic metres (2.2×1010 to 2.5×1010 cu ft) of water. The spring is the prime example in hydrogeology of a “Vaucluse spring”. It is the source of the Sorgue.
The Fontaine de Vaucluse was formed after the Messinian salinity crisis, during the latter part of the Messinian age of the Miocene epoch, from 5.96 to 5.33 Ma (million years ago), which caused the depth of the exsurgence.[2][3]
Above the spring there is a 230-metre (750 ft)-high limestone cliff with innumerable breaks and faults. This acts as a reservoir, a karst aquifer, in which the water circulates along the discontinuities until it meets a barrier of limestone and clay.
The spring, which feeds the River Sorgue, is the only exit point of a 1,100-square-kilometre (420 sq mi) underground basin, which captures waters from Mont Ventoux, the Vaucluse Mountains, the Albion Plateau(fr) and the Lure Mountain(fr).[4] The water of this exsurgence contains an average of 200 milligrams per litre (0.00012 oz/cu in) of calcium carbonate, and has an annual flow of about 700,000,000 cubic metres (2.5×1010 cu ft), so the reservoir loses 50,000 cubic metres (1,800,000 cu ft) of limestone each year.
This karstification phenomenon acting on the surface of the impluvium, removes an annual volume of 45 cubic metres (1,600 cu ft) per square kilometre, which disappears after being dissolved in the water.[5] That figure becomes more meaningful when calculations show that, in 3.5 million years, the Vaucluse Mountains, the Albion Plateau, and the Lure Mountain, will have had their thickness reduced by 1,500 metres (4,900 ft).[6]
What an awesome day out. Two old favourites that will never loose their charm. Pleasant drive with the roof down in glorious sunshine
How to visit a Super U when they used to clean their floors with Eau de Sewage floor cleaner.
Some stunning facts on the benefits of Covid vaccination.
As of October 12, 2021, more than 187 million people have been vaccinated. The number of deaths from COVID in vaccinated people sits around 7,000, meaning there’s about a 0.004 percent chance of death by COVID if you’ve been vaccinated. And even within that tiny percent, 85 percent of them are in the older than 65 age range. According to a recent CDC report, vaccinated people were, on average, five times less likely to get infected with COVID-19 and if they did get infected, vaccinated folks were 10 times less likely to be hospitalized or die from the novel virus compared to people who were not vaccinated.
Yet still the SSS – the snowflakes, the Selfish and the Stupid – resist.
Tuesday
Try out the electric bike as I nip round to the bakers for some Croisants and a Cereal Baguette. I’s a bit like driving a tank, very heavy and the electric assist takes a bit of getting used to.
Off to Arles today. Let’s go and see the arena. Don’t think we’ve been there before, but who knows with our aging memory.
Sadly what a dump Arles is. On a par with Beziers and Blackburn. Hard to judge which is the worst.
Splash out and go into the amphitheater, certainly very impressive, as was the theatre, both World Heritage sites but sadly lacking in imagination and presentation. No displays, videos or interaction. Such a pity as with gladiators and all the rest it could have been awesome, especially for the many school trips visiting. Mind you, when I look back to my school trip to see the Mersey tunnel this place certainly trumps that. They obviously use the arena for some big events, including that barbaric and uncivilised bull torturing, which they call a bull fight.
Wendy has the best Latte so far this trip.
Drive to a Super U supermarket to see if the Sewage smell is truly a thing of the past, and yes it is. It’s a massive, clean, spacious store with no bad smell. Do the rest of the weekly shop. Find 4 different bottles of red Coteaux de Aix en Provence so have to try each one. And they even sell Baked Beans, certainly gone up in my estimation. Buy a big piece of Monkfish, which fortunately she skins for us, but looks like we’ll have to fillet it.
Drive back across the Alpilles nature park. Very impressive.
Luxury tea tonight, Pilchard sandwiches – thanks to Peter and Brenda on our campsite – a very rare delicacy here in France, almost as rare as Baked Beans. All washed down with a strong, unfiltered Jenlain blond beer, all 750 Ml of it. By 19:30 I’m comatose.
Wow, that Amphitheatre would be great for some modern day, Saturday afternoon entertainment for the vaccinated masses. They could feed some of our Donky Politicians and bad web designers to some starving lions.
Wednesday
Out for 10:30. For some bizarre reason I’ve suggested we go to the market at St Remy de Provence, knowing full well that we’ll never buy anything. Wendy’s ultimate shopping trip, looking at it all yet not buying.
Some amazing dried sausage but we pass on the Donkey sausage. But those cheeses are making me drool. Then we discover a cheese shop, peering in through the window, like a child outside a toy shop. Resist going in as I know it would turn out expensive.
Give the Donkey sausage a pass. Wot no horse meat?
Wow, it’s quite a big market in a lovely little town. Can you believe for the first time ever we buy something? Some sugared almonds and while we’re on a roll some fennel. Loads of free samples, but as a pair of wimps we pass.
Then after a relaxing coffee, watching the motorists try to go over a zebra crossing. Pedestrians just have no consideration as a constant dribble across. Cars will be running out of petrol at this rate.
Then we’re off to Les Baux de Provence, a small hilltop fortress town in the middle of the Alpilles nature park. The rock formations are amazing and the small town is lovely, even if a tourist trap. I can’t imagine the hilltop castle was ever captured, what a fortress. As for anyone who says the French don’t wash they’ve obviously never been here, with more soap shops than stones at an islamic stoning.
We spend most of our time arguing as to whether we’ve ever been here before. There are glimpses that make us think we have, but neither of us can believe we would ever forget such awesome rock formations and quaint town. Then over coffee, we discover the pictures from September 2009 that prove we have. Thankfully we discover them on the way out. I think it would have really spoilt the experience if we’d realised when we arrived.
Then it’s back home for afternoon tea.
Wendy has to skin some more of the skin off and fillet the Monkfish we bought, guided by Youtube and sadly using a knife blunter than a child’s wooden toy sword. Then it’s Monkfish (never realised how ugly and messy the Monkfish is, – enough to put you off it for life) and an awesome red Coteaux de Aix en Provence for tea – I think a few of these may find their way into my car boot.
The Monkfish was great, so much bigger than the pieces you typically get in England.
End to another awesome day, cloudy with no sun but it was not cold. Despite the cloud we both feel sunburnt on our faces.
Another awesome day, despite being cloudy all day it did not spoil both places one jot. Added to which it is just so pleasant driving around these quiet country roads – but always keeping a wary eye out for the dreaded Priorite A Droite.
At last the sandwich has been resurrected here in Les Baux de Provence
Mighty weapons of war at Les Baux de Provence.
It’s troughing time for the French but not a sandwich to be had anywhere.
What have the French got against the sandwich? When I worked there the CEO always told me “We are not having the sandwich in here. Come on we’re going to lunch.” This roughly translated into a 2 hour, three-course meal, fortunately with wine and for most of them a cigarette between every mouthful, despite it being a no-smoking restaurant.
Vikings, the arrival
Yes, we have been here before.
What is it with BBC? Netflix, Apple TV, Amazon Prime and Disney can all stream TV without any interruptions. BBC streams TV with more interruptions and long pauses than a Christian preachers sermon at Speakers Corner. On top of which they have a web site designed by a 10 year old with social interraction skills of a hermit.
Thursday
The mythical monster.
I know let’s go and explore Tarascon and see if we can spot the Tarasque. Free parking well that’s a good start. Stroll down to the river and look at the pock-marked castle. Across to the church and head into what we think is the old quarter. Turns out to be a muslim ghetto, a bit like Audley Range, Blackburn, AKA The Kyber Pass. We get lost thanks to me relying on my innate sense of direction, which this time let me down. I’m sure it was constantly looking down to avoid the dog turds that got us lost. This place has to be the dog shit capital of France and that’s saying something.
When all the parking slots are full there’s always the 1,001 zebra crossings. Only in France.
Where’s the car. What’s more, will it still be there, complete with 4 wheels? Thank the FSM for Apple Maps and car locate. But watch where you’re stepping.
Drive over the river into Beaucaire, only marginally better, at least it has a pretty river with some boats on.
Oh well, we all make mistakes.
Inside the quarry art show.
Decide to get out of there and head over to the Carrières de Lumières at Les Baux de Provence. That’s if we can ever find our way out of this dump. With sat nav it was a nightmare, without sat nav you’d be condemned to driving around for all eternity.
“The old stone quarries of the Val d’Enfer are today the theatre for a magical show that changes its theme every year and which gave the site its name: “Carrières de Lumières” or “Quarries of Lights”. The masterpieces by great artists are projected onto the floor and 14-metre high walls of this stone cathedral.” Todays show was Cezanne and Kadinsky.
“Spectators standing in the decor itself will be blown away by the musical and artistic staging of this whirl of giant images.” It was expensive for us poor pensioners but worth it. Amazing and the music just complimented it all. What was even more amazing was how my iPhone brought it so much more to light than my eyes.
Then it’s back home, roof down driving through the Alpilles in glorious sunshine. A well-deserved cup of tea on our patio. Oh we Brits sure know how to live – civilised.
Tonight’s tea consists of Baked Beans with pork chops and tartiflette. First baked Beans for over a month. Sadly they were a tad undercooked, probably only 10 minutes, rather than the preferred 20 minutes – to kill all parasites, bacteria and viri – with the all-important knob of butter. If I’m ill tomorrow you’ll know it’s down to eating raw vegetables – yet another attempt on my life failed.
A visit to an art gallery with a difference , Carrie’res de Lumie’res( Quarries of Light ) it was spectacular , an exhibition of art combined with music projected onto the walls of the quarry. Awesome!
Recently some bright spark came up with an idea on how to limit rising sea levels. Simply get rid of all the boats?
Crazy I know, but I like outside-the-box ideas, so let’s indulge it. Randall Munroe recently tried to figure out how much of a difference it would make on global sea levels if every boat were plucked out of the water.
The answer? A whopping six microns, according to Munroe’s calculations, which is just about the thickness of a single strand of spider silk.
We’re saved!
You really can’t make this cluster f..k up. Yet again the UK has high Covid rates, the highest in Western Europe. Why? Because the donkeys in power won’t use common sense. Mask, vaccine, passport and limiting major gatherings are such simple effective measures to limit the spread. They are working in the rest of Europe, minimum inconvenience, such a small price to pay and save lives. They’re working here in France.
Instead, we seem hell-bent on cherishing the feelings of the snowflakes, the stupid and the selfish. What about all the unnecessary deaths, hospitalisations and suffering.
Interesting a recent survey show that 76% thought wearing a mask was a good idea. So why are so few wearing mask. Simples, what they really though was that other people wearing a mask was a good idea.
Friday
Our last full day so we’re heading off to Avignon. It seems they have a famous half bridge to nowhere. Only the French could keep such a navigation hazard.
Driving around Avignon is the usual chaos but we eventually find a handy car park at the Pope’s Palace. Another one of those cavernous underground car parks with red and green lights over each parking slot so you can easily see available spaces – neat. What’s not so neat is how tight the spaces are.
Now here’s a town that’s serious about Covid they even warn the cars about social distancing with “Mesure Covid” printed every 100 yards on the roads.
Wendy has lunch and I have coffee while we sit in the sunshine people watching. Then it’s off on a shopping spree. Wendy wants some gifty shops to look at. Not that she’ll but anything.
We give the Pope’s Palace a miss, already done the tour on a previous visit. Yes, another place we’ve been to before, but at least this time we remember it. Well worth the second visit.
Finally some words of Wisdom from Winston.
The objective for the day is to walk on that famous bridge. It seems like it’s one of the best-kept secrets in Avignon, not a sign to be had telling you how to get to it. Walk up to the garden Rocher Des Doms thinking we’ll be able to get to it from there. Some great views of it but alas can’t walk to it. Finally, find our way to it. An impressive structure and yet another World Heritage site. Objective achieved we finally also find some gifty shops for Wendy to browse. Does she buy anything? Does she heck.
Leisurely drive back home for afternoon tea on the patio followed by The Holy Trinity of the table, wine, cheeses and bread. When we get home we really need to have this once a week.
Another gorgeous sunny day, some relaxing people watching over lunch and a World Heritage site to visit.
The Saint Bénezet bridge, a major witness of the history of Avignon, is known throughout the world thanks to the famous song. Built from the 12th century, it was washed away several times by the floods of the Rhone, and finally abandoned in the seventeenth century. Classified World Heritage by UNESCO.
According to the legend, the bridge was built in the 12th century by a young shepherd from Ardèche – Bénezet – who heard voices telling him to build a bridge in Avignon. Yet, another schizophrenic in the World of religion. An uneducated shepherd, Bénézet (born c.1165 – died c 1184, feast day April 14, patron saint of bridge builders) claimed that he was divinely commanded in a vision to build the bridge at a point where the force of the Rhône was so great that it had discouraged even Roman engineers in antiquity.
At first, people took him for a madman, but he had heard a voice from heaven telling him : “Bénézet, take your crook and go to Avignon, the capital by the water : you will speak to the inhabitants and you will tell them that a bridge must be built”.
One Sunday holiday, while the bishop of Avignon gave his blessing on the square in front of Notre-Dame, Bénézet called to him : “Lord Bishop, I have been commissioned by the Almighty to build a bridge across the Rhône”…
Mocked by the Avignonnais, the shepherd was challenged by the prelate to take an enormous stone on his shoulders and throw it into the Rhône. Bénézet doesn’t hesitate an instant, and watched by the amazed crowd, picked up the stone block and threw it into the water, helped, they say, by divine intervention, and even by angels bathed in golden light.
The bishop of Avignon, at first skeptical, finally approved the project, and work began in 1177. Bénézet reputedly overcame many obstacles miraculously, and the construction of the bridge was said to have caused 18 miraculous healings. Convinced that the work was ordained by God, wealthy patrons formed the first “Bridge-Building Brotherhood” to fund Bénézet’s endeavour. The bridge was completed in 1185, creating the only place to cross the Rhône between Lyon and the Mediterranean sea. The bridge originally spanned approximately 900 meters and had 22 arches. It was dismantled in 1226, then rebuilt. It was later washed away several times by flood waters and rebuilt until it was abandoned in the 17th century. Today, all that remains are four arches and a chapel dedicated to Saint Nicolas. The bridge is famous the world over due to the lovely children’s song “Sur le pont d’Avignon”.
The Pont d’Avignon was a true feat of engineering, and was continually being worked on and repaired. A source of legends, an emblematic monument of the area, the bridge has been the subject of unprecedented interdisciplinary research since 2010.
And here’s the clock counting down the days to Israels destruction.
News Flash from the English Coastguard.
The Royal Navy intercepted three boatloads of people off the Kent coast this morning.
This placed the Navy in a rather awkward position, as the boats were not heading to, but rather away from Kent and towards France.
Another surprise was that the boats weren’t loaded with migrants as expected, but with British Pensioners.
Their claim was they were trying to get to Calais so as to be able to return to the UK as migrants and therefore be entitled to substantially more benefits than they currently receive as legitimate British Pensioners.
The Navy it is believed, gave them food, water and extra fuel and assisted them on their journey.
We are in the process of arranging further trips and if you’re interested please fill out the document below.
Thank You.
What an awesome week in a lovely, comfortable Provencal Bungalow set in it’s own grounds, complete with 3 electric bikes, lawns, patio, swimming pool and an imposing set of iron gates to keep the World at bay.
The area was lovely and after the traffic and noise of city life, it was a pleasure to drive around, so less stressful. Many great little places to visit, even though we’d been to most of them before. I’d always wanted to VRBO around the South of France and this was the South of France at its best.
If ever we can’t make it to America this has to be the second-best choice. We’d come again.
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Out by 09:30 and off on the road to Cannes. Really screwed up on the distance. As the crow flies Annecy to Cannes is about 168 miles, so thought that’s not a bad stretch. Turns out that the quickest route is about 320 miles – 5 hours – fortunately all by autoroute, expensive but so much less stressful than UK motorways. The only downside is French drivers seem to want to see what’s inside my exhaust pipe, or perhaps they’re mesmerised and drawn to my new UK sticker, complete with Union flag. Have they never heard of safe stopping distance? A complete lack of common sense, dangerous.
Balcony view.
Stop off in Provence for Wendy’s lunch. Glorious sunshine, bright blue sky and warmth. Get to Cannes about 16:00.
Our home exchange hosts are there to meet us and show us around the apartment – see pictures. All very comfortable and quality furnished with an amazing balcony and view of Cannes Bay. They’ve left us some essentials like roles, jam, toilet roll and not forgetting wine.
Bedroom.
Have to dash out to the supermarket. A shithole of an Intermarche with a disgusting underground garage, the black mold is taking over the staircase, like some sort of horror movie.
Back to the apartment and soon set up Apple TV, with red wine, brad and cheese for tea. Sleep through yet another episode of Sex Education
Amazing view over Cannes Bay from the balcony.
The origins of the quran:
Supermarket with 4 cash desks, 3 of them swap staff at the same time, so only one in operation. Customers have been in line that long some of them are now eligible for their pension. Then when they finally get to the lone checkout girl they get to witness checkout at the speed of an arthritic tortoise. Send the cashiers to Aldi for some speed training. Why I’ve even got a new phrase – “Slower than a French supermarket checkout”.
An hours free parking at the supermarket. They’ve obviously never shopped with Wendy. Why she needs at least that to get past the tinned goods isle.
Sunday
Kitchen
Really lazy day. Unfortunately we have to find a supermarket to do the weeks shop – looks like it’s another Casino, one of the few supermarkets with some parking. Roads around our apartment have obviously been laid out following the trail of a druken snail, not a straight stretch anywhere.
Then spend the rest of the day just enjoying the apartment and the views, along with a little beer and wine. Weathers a mixture of sun and cloud but at least it’s warm.
What is it with the French and their 22 character passwords. Password for nuclear launch codes would be shorter. Are they that worried about some stolen wifi. Fortunately most of them have, and desperately need, a QR code to scan. Apples share password code feature is a life saver or else I think we’d still be sat there typing passwords.
Then you might wonder how come I’ve a photograph of a French bank vault? Wrong, it’s the steel door to our apartment. Is this a high crime area?
Monday
Bathroom with bizarre shower.
Yeah, glorious sunshine and temperatures around 20 of those damn EU units.
Do battle with the shower, or should I say lack of it. There’s just a shower hose in the bath not even on the wall. How can people live without a proper shower? Another querk of this lovely well-appointed apartment is the lack of cups, just one with a handle and two without – much too hot for folk like me who don’t have asbestos hands.
Cannes old port.
A beautiful sunny blue sky day, time to sit outside and enjoy the peace and quiet, the view and relax …..they only decide to do roadworks outside the apartment. Never mind they’ll pack up by 12:00 for the day.
After our usual lazy start we set off down to the port in the old town. Plenty of expensive outdoor parking. Wow, we get to see the 5th British car this whole trip. The French economy must be really suffering and if that Macron geeezer doesn’t improve his demeanour and attitude to the Brits then hopefully we’ll stay away in droves – mind you they’ll have got shut of him by next year.
Street mural. in Cannes.
Great this lazy start to the day, by the time we hit the shops they’re all closed for a two hour lunch. A bizzare idea, what do they find to do in the two hours – answers on a postcard.
Have a walk along the front and as usual, there’s a big expo on in the conference centre promoting and selling French TV series. Of course the tourist info centre is closed for lunch.
Have a walk around the old town and then along the beach. Gorgeous weather and all very pleasant.
Coffee at a beach cafe, no rush just watching the world and the fully clothed go by. Wot no topless beaches and supermarkets with no baked beans. Like the UK this country is going to the dogs too.
Finally, get to see 20 stone of topless adipose tissue, those nipples are scraping her knees. Enough to put anyone off sex or women for life, should be used in aversion therapy. No need to apply electric shocks just the sight alone would do the job. I was going to post a picture of something similar but feared for my reader’s sanity.
Back home for a leisurely beer and wine.
Driving around Cannes is sheer hell, traffic lights and zebra crossings every 10 feet; narrow streets unfit for even a scooter; twists and bends enough to wear your steering wheel out; pedestrians who don’t know the difference between roads and pavements; drivers with zero patience; carved up twice now by bitches in mercs, of course I’ve given them the Churchill salute; cyclists who ignore all conventions, mind you that’s the same the world over; and if all else fails you have an exhaust bandit trying to drive his extended phallus up my exhaust pipe.
Someone should level the whole place an install an American North / South and East / West grid system – I know we’re a couple of Philistines. As for those American friends who say the UK’s roads are narrow they should come to this hell hole.
I start every day vowing not to loose my temper but within 5 minutes of this hell I’ve lost it.
Tuesday
Cannes beach.
Lazy start and then we take a leisurely drive, much to most drivers dismay, down the awesome corniche to St Raphael. Some stunning views over the sea but not many places to stop off and enjoy them.
Free parking in St R. Wendy lashes out and has a fish burger at MacD’s. Their coffee is great. So we sit by the sea like two old dears. Alas no really pleasant sights on the beach. Not really much to see in the town.
Coffee on the beach.
Then we get back and it’s yet another supermarket. God only knows how Wendy manages to need a daily shop. That’s it now no more supermarkets in Cannes.
Yeah, sat on the balcony with bread, cheese and wine – the Holy Trinity of the table – for tea tonight. Much to Wendy’s annoyance, I could live on this. So what do these items have in common? Never thought of it that way before but they all rely upon yeast.
According to government statistics during 2020 HGV’s travelled 16.4 billion vehicle miles. During that same period 3.07 billion of those miles the HGV’s were empty. That’s 18.7% empty. As well as recruiting more drivers perhaps it is also time to look at working smarter and use IT to reduce that waste.
Meanwhile to the mafflards (A mafflard is a term for someone who is a pure klutz. Words and Phrases From The Past calls a mafflard “a stammering or blundering fool; a term of contempt.”) responsible for these statistics, perhaps it might help if you decided upon one unit of measure, preferably miles, rather than sometimes using miles and others using that Evil Union measure, kilometres.
Wednesday
Relaxing sunset.
Lazy start to a gorgeous sunny day then off down to the other end of Cannes for a very English, complete with panama hat, stroll along the prom. Seems like the French also like their stroll along the prom too.
Beach cafes at this end of Cannes are vey expensive so being cash strapped pensioners we stroll down to other beaches to our previous days watering spot. One cafe allonge lasts a whole hour of people watching on the beach. Wendy tries a Latte and survives it, hope she’s not going to start polluting my coffee machine with all that milk. What’s happened to the french, the women seem to have become a nation of prudes, no eye-candy sights to keep me entertained.
On .he road to St Raphael.
Of course there’s yet another film / TV series festival on, which probably explains the high police presence, baacked up by army patrols armed to the teeth with enough firepower to initiate WW3. Mind you with the number of members of the religion of pieces and permanent offense in this country it’s not surprising.
Well a really good walk today, all of 4.7 miles.
It’s Kurt’s birthday and as usual we’re away for it. Give him a ring to wish him happy birthday and say hello to the kids. Of course its the witching hour before they go to bed, they’re feral. After 5 minutes we’re ready to turn to drink to cope with the nosie and excitement. Within that short chat one of them is banished to the naughty step – I’ll leave it to your imagination as to what her name was. How do Kurt and Fiona cope with them, they both look stressed and in dire need of alcohol. But we still miss the kids.
Shucks, how did those lilly white boobs manage to spoil my photo.
Really can’t understand this awesome appartment. Just one bathroom with no shower other than a hand held shower in the bath. In this day and age how do people cope without a proper shower? Even more bizarre is only one bathroom in a two bedroom apparment and you have to walk through the master bedroom to get to it. You imagine, there you are on one of your finest rumpo moments and in strolls a child or someone from the other bedroom needing a pee – “Oh don’t mind me!”.
When I look at the layout it almost seems like there’s some lost space. Why didn’t they put a door from the hall into the bathroom. Tapping walls looking for priest holes or hidden compartments. But alas nothing. Oh well, they’re french and in a country with Priorite Adroite and no baked beans anything goes.
islam – the religion of peace
What is it with the French and their weird fascination with bathroom sinks? There are thousands of perfectly sensible designs, but it seems that there’s an excess of designers out there who have to come up with new crazy, impractical designs – deep, square, flat – to justify their existence, that the gullible French rush out to buy, like a nerd dashing to buy a new Apple product. And yet they leave kitchen sinks alone, no messing with that common-sense design.
Thursday
Beach at Nice.
A sun and cloud day but nice and warm. Let’s go to Nice and ambulate down the Promenade Des Anglais, it’s a long while since we were there.
It’s only 25 minute drive and I’d already keyed in a car park to make life easy. Find the car park, supposedly with 380 places, this one only had about 30. Oh well it’ll do. And then I see the price.
Wendy buys a sandwich and we sit on the promenade while she eats it and fends off pigeins and aggresive seagulls. The colour of the sea is amazing. If nothing else it was worth it just for that. Have a walk down to the far end of the promonade and back. The beach is all pebbles not a bit like the ones at Cannes. All in all quite disappointing and note to oneself, don’t bother coming again, Cannes is so much nicer.
Yeah, the Union flag is at least 6″ higher than the French one.
Stop off for a coffee on the beach. So all in all it’s costs us e23.90 (parking 7, tolls 7, coffee and water 9.90).
Drive home for afternood tea on the balcony, followed by a beer, some wine, Chicken Faijatas and a good snooze through some mediocre TV. Lovely eating tea out on the balcony in glorious technicolour sunshie and that amazing view.
Two items of delight today. The Azure blue sea at Nice and tea on the balcony overlooking Cannes – how lucky can we be.
Fear not said he, all the French fishermen’s sabre rattling will amount to not even a sardine as of course the French authorities will step in and stop their illegal activities. In your dreams.
Friday
Promenade de Anglais in Nice.
A midnight revelation. I get up in the middle of the night to turn the heating down and notice a light shining from the wardrobe in the 2nd bedroom. Go to open the doors and turn it off and revealed in all it’s glory is an en-suite bathroom in the 2nd bedroom. Not just any old en-suite but one with a PROPER SHOWER. For 5 days now we’ve just thought the doors to this haven to cleanliness was a wardrobe. The doors looked like a wardrobe and our hosts never showed us this feature. That explains the lost space. Proper showers from now on.
Pink carpet at TV series festival. No stars.
Our last full day in Cannes so after a lazy start and Wendy’s lunch we head off down to the old Port.
Have a saunter around the old town. Wendy sees a dress we both like, that’s rare, but sadly the shop is closed for lunch. We call in on the way back. “One size fits all.” says the shop assistant “put a belt around”. Never mind that it still hangs off her shoulders like supermans cloak. Ridiculous. It’s a wonder she didn’t tell us it would shrink to a perfect fit with wear.
Stroll down onto the beach for a coffee and a last relax by the sea.
I’ve just started to apprecaite the layers of Cannes:
Firstly you have the sea, in the bay of Cannes, and it’s awesome blue colour. With the occaisonal luxury yacht anchored in the bay.
Then there’s the lovely sandy beach with it’s restaurants and cafes where you can relax for an hour over a welcome stretched coffee.
Next, you have the promenade with plenty of free seating, blue chairs.
Forgetting the road the next is the expensive hotels and apartments with awesome sea views.
Sadly we then come onto the “Morlock’s” layer. Full of parked cars, windy streets unfit for a single bike lane never mind cars, scooters and electric scooters weaving in and out. Not forgetting those French with miniscule dicks who seem to need to be astride a powerful, ear-shattering motorbike as a phallus to compensate for their tiny penis and shrivelled brains.
Finally, you get to Super Cannes. Unique, distinctive, expensive houses and prestigous appartment blocks, with balconies and awesome views, all built on the hillside. With narrow, but quiete, roads snaking around them. A haven of quiet (well would be quiet if they weren’t digging up our road) sophisticated luxury. This is where our appartment is.
I’m not usually one to bang on about human rights but for Iran I’ll make an exception. Every thing you need to know about human right in Iran.
https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/middle-east-and-north-africa/iran/report-iran/
Occaisonally one of the Morlocks escapes on their noisy, two wheeled phalus, and disturbs my quiet relaxation on the balcony up in Super Cannes. If only I had a snipers rifle. Mind you I do have some empty glass Fischer beer bottles.
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Oh the joys of packing up your caravan in the pouring rain. Anyone want to buy a caravan? I really do start to wonder why we’re still doing this caravanning lark. Must be mad. When you think about it, with the awning, we spend a day setting up and a day packing up. Only really viable for a 3 or more week stay. Reminds me yet again that I don’t want to be towing.
Drive down to Versailles is pretty uneventful The French roads and toll roads a a pleasure to drive on.
Arrive at our Novotel in Versailles after a three hour drive.
Hotel’s very smart. Have a stroll down the town, trying to avoid the rain.
Evening meal in the hotel is good but very limited menu.
ISIS has nothing to do with islam
I know the Americans have some difficult understanding the concept of a roundabout, but at least I thought the Europeans were comfortable with it. Alas, not so. In Versailles they have roundabouts with Priorite a Droite (Priority to traffic coming from the right) on all the roads joining the alleged roundabout. How chaotic is that?
I thought priority a droite had been abandoned all over France, but it seems it’s still clinging on, especially in rural areas. Ox carts and horse and carts are very rare in France these days but still this craziness persist. Bonkers. That along with a hole in the ground toilets and a national spate of toilet seat thefts should be enough to have them expelled from the EU.
Sunday
After a good breakfast we’re off in the rain to the Palace of Versailles. Fortunately only a 20 minute walk from the hotel.
Well, it seems that somehow the French Secret Service – DGSI: Direction générale de la sécurité intérieure – have somehow been spying on me at breakfast and detected my desecration of a croissant. Yes, I confess I put jam on them. When I present my French pass sanitaire to get in the palace of Versailles it is rejected – am I now on a watch list? Funny how it’s accepted everywhere else and Wendy’s is accepted. My English one works – don’t mess with the British.
How the gardens should have been in the sun.
Then I try to go through the scanner. No luck. Take everything off, still no luck. Next, it’ll be the sound of a rubber glove and down to underwear. It must be the DGSI or again my titanium implant in my femur – strange how my bionic leg has never caused a problem before. In typical French fashion, they give up and decide it’s best to let me through.
I wonder whether it was my leather cowboy hat that made them think I’m a American so let’s give him a hard time.
It’s very impressive, the palace that is. It’s massive, they reckon you need a whole day to see the inside properly. Us philistines are not that cultured and really just like to get an overview and sense of the place without examining everything. A guided tour would be the death of us. There are that many paintings there’s just no need for wallpaper. So it’s a whistle-stop tour. They really need a fast lane to avoid the dawdlers. We must set a new world record in just 70 minutes, mind you the Gallery of great battles is closed – I bet there’s nothing in there for Agincourt, WW1 or WW2!
Still pouring with rain so we give the awesome looking gardens a miss. Most of my pictures have been acquired from the Internet rather than photos with bald heads and selfie sticks intruding.
Expensive but glad we’ve seen it. Wendy – xenophobe – much preferred Windsor Castle but nowhere near as big.
Set off down to Beaune, wine capital, for our next stop. Once we escape the hell of Paris suburbs were on our way down South. Toll roads most of the way but no hold-ups and light traffic. Why if it wasn’t for the rain it could even be enjoyable.
And the bit we were swizzled out of.
Arrive at our Ibis hotel in Beaune. Well we all make mistakes. Our rooms been designed by someone from Lilliput. The door won’t even open fully because it bangs into the bed. As for the shower, only thin people wash. No blobbies would ever get in the rooms.
Another bit of bad news is they don’t do evening meals so we have to venture out into yet more rain to find a restaurant. Wot, you want to eat on a Sunday evening, it’s our day of rest, one of many. Finally, find a restaurant open. Limited menu until 18:00 so it’s French onion soup followed by Beef Bourgeoning. Good French fare.
Back to the rabbit hutch in the rain and finish off my bottle of wine to help me cope with the claustraphobia.
Well we’ve solved the illegal immigrant problem for Priti Useless. Just visited this big – it’s very big – empty council house in Versailles. Get the French to spend some of the 54 million on moving the illegals in Calais to this empty place. There’s room for them all. Simples. Problem solved.
Monday
And if your husband didn’t buy you a washing machine then you can always pop along here to do the weekly wash – I know sexist.
Breakfast is very mediocre and small portions, no doubt to save money. Mind you if you had a big hearty breakfast you’d risk not being able to slither into the room.
We see a real blobby arrive, who as we guessed is one of the cleaners. I’d be amazed, being that fat, that she could even get into the rooms.
You lives and you learns and today’s lesson is avoid Ibis hotels – we’ve stayed in some tolerable ones in the past, especially Ibis Styles.
Have a stroll around Beaune and a coffee before setting off for our VRBO in Lake Annecy. We pass on visiting the Hospital with the awesome roof again.
Just watched the guy set up this umbrella on the right. What does he think will happen when it rains. That man don’t have the brains God graced a bale of hay.
It’s motorway for all but the last three miles. The drive through the mountains is impressive, would be more so if it wasn’t rain and cloud.
As we get into Annecy we see a mega Carrefour supermarket. As we’re early we go in to do our shop and save us coming out again. Sadly it’s just too big with prize winning slow checkout girls.
Get to the road where the car park for our apartment is. Drive up and down it three times looking for the car park. What we don’t realise is that there’s another half of the road across the major road and of course we’re on the wrong side of the major road. Finally, find it and negotiate all the secret codes, locks and doors, to arrive at our very pleasant apartment, it’s lovely and well kitted out.
Soon get set up after wearing out a keyboard inputting a 20 character, yes 20 characters mixed numbers and letters, enough to protect the nuclear missile launch code. The world has gone mad.
Finally all working, Apple TV up and running for Netflix etc. Home from home.
British tourist deported from France for desecration of a croissant. As he’s put into a rubber dinghy and pushed off the Calais beach in the direction of Dover he shouts, “Nothing like Apricot jam on your first croissant of the visit. Wot no butter!”.
Tuesday
Weather dictates our day. Sun and cloud in the morning followed by yet more rain in the afternoon, so we’re off out early. Well 10:00 is very early for us.
Have a stroll down to the lake with plans of a relaxing coffee by the lake. “There’ll be loads of cafes overlooking the lake” I say. Alas wrong again, not a one.
But, there’s a trade union gearing up for a protest no doubt. Must be France. Wot no yellow jackets.
It’s very pleasant though walking by the lake and eventually we find a cafe by a river in the old town.
Then stroll back with Wendy carping on about how far it is. But then she spies a Casino supermarket to brighten her day. Can you believe that to get out of the store you have to scan the barcode on your receipt? Technology gone mad. What happens if you don’t buy anything?
First impressions of Annecy are good.
Afternoon lazing around, it’s what we do best.
We have a press that can cause fuel chaos with their calamitous reporting yet can’t be bothered to challenge the donkeys in power.
The latest from Preti Useless is sending illegals to Albania, vociferously denied by the Albanian government. Whatever happened to sending them to a shithole, like Rwanda, for processing? How many have been turned back at sea as a result of the training given? Both seem like great ideas. Why aren’t the press on the case with these two issues instead of sensationalist headlines that are exaggerating and causing chaos?
If France was serious about solving the problem and earning their £54M then it’s simple, why don’t they just let us send them back to France. It wouldn’t be long before the illegals got the message. But let’s face it they want to be shut of them.
Time for ACTION THIS DAY as Churchill would have said. Such a pity Boris can’t emulate his hero.
Wednesday
Yet again plan our day around the weather forecast.
Off for a drive around Lake Annecy. I’d expected it to be a goodly distance but it turns out to be only 25 miles. Not really that much to see other than views of the lake, including a spectacular one from a mountain top – see photos. But overall a pleasant drive.
Halfway round and the heavens open up yet again. Good to know that the French weather forecasts are as random as ours.
Back in time for afternoon tea.
Tackle a Beaune wine, it’s ok but not one I’d queue up to buy.
Red pilled Euro whore
After 14 years of retirement it’s time for a 1st amendment to my laws of retirement. It’s very simple.
11th Law – Avoid shopping in a super market with Wendy.
Thursday
Our apartment in Annecy. Lovely.
Very lazy start to the day. Catch up on blog and try and reconcile my Siesta Key booking. The joys of an amateur travel agent.
After Wendy’s lunch, we take a stroll into the town. Learn that restaurants and brasseries insist on you having food. If you want just a coffee or even a just a beer then you must go to a cafe or bar.
Have a coffee by the river and then explore the city centre, well at least what we think is the city centre. We’re saving exploration of the old town until tomorrow, market day.
Back home for afternoon tea.
Extra hot Stag chilli, supplemented with plenty of mince meat, for my tea. Quality food.
Another example of lack of common senese in design. Wendy is about 5 foot 1″ tall and the average female in Europe is 5 foot 3″ tall, yet no way can Wendy reach to close this cupboard, even on tiptoes and even after all that traction treatment. How to spoill a lovely kitchen.
Friday
Up and ready early to go to the market in the old town Wendy’s orgasmic. Have to be there before 12:00 or else they’ll have all packed up early and shot off home to gobble up their frogs legs and snails.
I don’t know why we ever bother going to a French market, we never buy anything. Although I have to admit they do have some awesome-looking cheese, bread and meats, plus a wide selection of fresh fruit and vegetables. Really quite entertaining and colourful.
Stop off for a beer but it’s quite cold so I settle for a coffee allonge.
Call in at a Subway for tonight’s tea. Their consistency all over the world is amazing, yes you can always guarantee they’ve run out of something. Today it’s tomatoes. Probably one of their most popular items. I suggest they pop around to the market and buy some before they close. That went down like a lead balloon and all of a sudden they no longer understood English.
Back home for lunch. It’s still grey and cool and not a glimpse of the forecast sun.
14:00 French time and the Apple watch can be ordered in the UK. Order an apple watch 7 in aluminium. Would have liked to get the stainless steel but instead of £399 they’re £699 because they come with lavish watch straps. I’ve still got my Milanese Loop, it’s smart and still in good fettle. Yes, I know I’m the nerd who would be dashing to buy a cardboard box if Apple sold one, but in fairness, my current watch is a series 4 and 4 years old.
Wendy gets packed ready for an early start and a 5 hour drive to Cannes. A major navigation screw up there, on the map as the crow flies it only looked about 200 miles. Turns out it was even less at 168 but there are mountains in the way so you have to travel about 320 miles.
Well it seems that Wendy’s been washing the pots with rinse aid. No wonder we need to scrape the detritus off the plates!
I see the press are now trying to create more shortages with their latest contributions to chaos:
“Why soaring gas prices could leave toilet paper in short supply”.
“Fears of Quality Street shortage over Christmas as Nestle hit by HGV driver crisis”.
“Almost a third of petrol stations in London and southeast England are either dry or have just one grade of fuel”.
Perhaps it’s time for some retaliation with two new press releases:
“Fears that newspaper ink could cause cancer”.
“Fears that reading press scare stories of gloom and doom could cause senile dementia”.
“…could….” that all-important word used by the press to achieve their dubious ends. Is our press infested with 5th columnists, enemies of the state and anarchists?
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Rain forecast and again the forecast was right.
A gorgeous warm sunny day so we toddle off down to Sarasota Bay Front for a stroll around and a coconut shrimp lunch for Wendy. I get treated to a cup of typical black American dishwater coffee.
Then have a stroll around Sarasota and Wendy is orgasmic as she gets a visit to WholePayPacket (aka Wholefoods). Then, despite having to pay a Kings ransom for everything, no wonder they hide the prices, she begrudges me some Shark Steak and Mahi for tea.
What a great start to the day as I open the door to see how warm it is and there on a palm tree is a beautiful red bellied woodpecker singing his morning song.
What is it with USPS. Every time we encounter them they seem to screw up. They missed yesterdays delivery deadline, then claimed they’d delivered it at 14:55 today. Alas no parcel on the doorstep. Turns out the parcels small enough to hammer into the post box on the street. As a Brit we expect delivery to the door. Just one of the things that we excel at.
Free Oceans Eleven Big band performance in the park, in the sun, with all the rest of the waiting for god brigade. Is this what life’s come to? And now, as predicted, some geriatrics get up shuffle around. Sad but by the time some of then manage to get to the dance concrete the songs over. Not exactly dirty dancing. A bit like a Deer Valley concert sat in our deer valley approved chairs. No wonder there’s so many vultures circling above.
Another glorious hot sunny day. Take an afternoon stroll down to Turtle beach. Sit and watch the Pelicans entertain us. Then a major sin as we go to a bar and have a beer before 17:00. Wendy has a rum and coke and then staggers home – lightweight.
Leaving day. We have to be out by 10:00 or they very arrogantly offer to charge us another full day.
Finally get to our next home in Pompano Beach for a week. Can’t get in before 16:00. It’s all very nice, clean and modern. But what is it about American houses, they’re always so dark, like going into a funeral parlour, and very rarely have a decent central ceiling light. 
Gorgeous sunny and warm day. Take a morning stroll to the outdoor Pickleball site. Just 10 minutes walk to 12 FREE outdoor Pickleball courts. All properly marked out with permanent nets. Even have forms to sit on. Pickleball Florida style. 
Wendy has her sandwich lunch at the park. We take a stroll across to the Fort Lauderdale beach and then have an amble around the Hammock trail. Take a drive around the park and a stroll down the coastal waterway, wow it’s rough today.
