Ahoy there

Hi! Busy couple of weeks behind us, and it's fair to say we're both completely over this 9-5 malarkey! Managed to celebrate Anzac Day, albeit only with a couple of poppies, not a dawn service, and even then, I had to enter some fairly longwinded negotiations with the RBL (the equivalent of the RSA) to get hold of them, as they don't like them being worn outside of Remembrance time, which is November... I did suggest the woman I spoke to might like to remember that other countries fought in the war too, and that we were all on the same side. She was not amused by this stage. Neither was I, but after a bit more explaining (I honestly thought they would know about Anzac Day, being a vets organisation, but apparently not) she did let me have a couple of poppies (which are rubbish compared to the ones at home). Really, you'd think I'd asked for two of her children, not a couple of bits of paper and plastic!

We have been getting better at not wasting our time away from the office and last weekend we headed up to Norfolk (the next county over from us) to go boating on the Broads, which are a series of canals/lakes created in the Middle Ages when England had a desire to burn peat like it was going out of fashion, so they dug lots of it up, leaving bloody great big holes, which have filled as the sea level has risen.
Thank goodness they did, really, because it was quite fun - Kent even let me control the boat for some of the journey - brave, given that it's all the opposite to what we're used to: steering wheel on the left, keep to the right, etc. To be fair though, at a speed of 5mph max, there wasn't too much danger... and we did manage to pull a couple of what might loosely be termed 'donuts', but they're a bit less spectacular at 4mph. It may also have been good practice for when we take the car over to France, Belgium and Luxembourg at the end of the month - eeek!
Being spring, the trees are looking a lot less skeletal than when we first arrived, and there were lots of baby things around, ducklings following their mums into the water and the like, and it was all rather lovely (and interesting too, Kent informs me)...
Along the way we encountered pirates... the stag party variety, who'd decorated their boat with Jolly Rodger flags and dressed up (which I've suggested to Kent for my next birthday celebration)...the Ice Cream boat, which is like a Mr Whippy, only on the water - especially brilliant, as it was by far and away the warmest day of the year so far - I even managed to stay in tshirt, shorts and jandals all day - hooray... and some of the cutest thatched roof cottages. It's not hard to see why it's a very popular area in the summer, our photos are here:


We both agree that, if we're being impartial, Norfolk is quite a bit prettier than Suffolk, though we won't be saying that out loud anytime soon.
We headed up the same way yesterday, to King's Lynn, about an hour and a half away from home, to have a nosey but we forgot to take the camera - oops! It used to be the third largest port in England and has ties to Admiral Lord Nelson, who led the English to victory (and promptly died in the final moments) in the Battle of Trafalgar. Princess Diana went to primary school there, and it's about 6 miles away from Sandringham, where the Queen lives sometimes... We didn't go there though, as I was in my jandals and in no state to be having tea and cucumber sammies with her majesty - as we share a birthdate, I feel sure she would have invited us in for high tea. With no camera to prove our new friendship either, it would have been a journey wasted, so we'll save it for next time.
On our way home we visited the Wash, where Kent suggested we wait until after a gigantic ship had gone past before we left. Whilst it was indeed an interesting sight, the resulting waves which came up and onto the marshes where we were standing were less exciting and more, err, marshy. Our last stop was Castle Acre, which, as you might guess from the name, has a castle - one which is falling down and was therefore free to visit. It's also the home of our favourite pub so far, 'The Ostrich', so we'll definitely head up that way again soon.
Kent has also requested that I mention the football - he's been at the Ipswich Town v Hull game this afternoon, which everyone (well, me) thought was a foregone conclusion, as Hull are at the top of the league and Town have been floating around the middle... but it was a Town 1-0 victory, so he is happy - although he informs me there were a couple of questionable refereeing decisions, but hey, his team won, and could still make the playoffs (if lots of others lose, and if you stand on your left leg, and poke your right eye with a wooden spoon, I imagine), so it's all good.
That's us for now, we're off on our mystery trip next weekend, so will be in touch soon.
Kent & Eryn x

Best Boyfriend EVER!

Last Monday was Eryn’s birthday. Some of you might have heard!

On Saturday, with the great help of Angus & Janet and Dave James, DJ to the stars, we had her surprise birthday party…

Okay… Kent did write a blog about my surprise party last weekend, but he was a bit modest and really played the whole thing down… so I’ve deleted and replaced it with what really happened:
I really am soooo unobservant… so many chances for me to figure it out, and still I was completely oblivious!
Angus and Janet (Kent’s cousin and his wife) came up from London for the weekend… had a good time with them on Saturday as Kent had to ref a game of football (or so I thought)… went to Framlingham Castle (for the second time in three days… this time to pick up the football that Kent had kicked over the castle wall when he was playing sillybuggers with his cousin Thomas a couple of nights earlier – oops, his bad) and for a bit of a tiki tour of Suffolk…
Kent had said he’d be home around 6.15pm (which, in hindsight, seemed an awfully long time after he said the game started, but being the trusting lamb that I am, it didn’t occur to me that something might be up), so we mucked around till about then and headed home… with Angus covertly calling ahead to alert HQ – which again, I didn’t really pick up on… don’t think MI5 will be recruiting me anytime soon!
They even made sure I reached the door first, only to open it to a number of my friends yelling ‘Surprise!” which was, well, a surprise! I have always secretly hoped someone would throw me a surprise party, but it’s not exactly the kind of thing you say out loud, is it, otherwise it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it? So, I was pretty damn pleased… especially considering Kent’s dislike of surprises, drinking and general partying… I think after I’d had a couple of vodkas, I may have mentioned to both Kent and virtually everyone else present (as well as my parents on the phone) what a lovely/wonderful/insert flattering adjective here boyfriend he is… He also made a rather spectacular cake and arranged for fireworks too… BEST BIRTHDAY EVER!
A few photos are there if you click on the picture of the cake:

Take care,

Kent & Eryn x

Few things happening

Bonjour, quick catch up on what is happening abouts.

Eryn's birthday on Monday 21st... please don't forget. You know what she's like.

Angus and Janet are heading up this weekend for a couple of night which will be great. We have been down to their city pad a couple of times recently so it will be nice to have them up here at our quiet rural retreat.

Eryn had a car "incident" on Monday. She is fine. She ran into the back of a stationary car at a roundabout, and wrote our Corsa off. Oops her bad.

YAY we beat Norwich today 2-1. Our local derby. Yay (clear, 42 characters. Eryn says I should mention that this is football/soccer/Beautiful Game, but this shouldn't count on my "not allowed too much about football on our blog tally") If Eryn hadn't smashed the car into the back of someone there would have been more room for football news.

Ohh, some of you may not be aware as she keeps these things fairly quiet, but its Eryns birthday next Monday.

Eryn's had her radio debut on British radio this week. Did one hour while the usual host had a MEETING. "I've got a meeting, do you want to do an hour or so?" What? Anyway she said it went well and the listeners liked her.

Booked next trip, four days with the car cruising around the north of France, Belgium and Luxembourg. Are trying to book two nights in an 11C castle and have another two in a nice wee B&B on the border of France and Belgium.

Kent and Eryn x

Czy mówisz po angielsku? (Do you speak English?)

Fortunately for us, most of the people we ran into in Krakow did – thank goodness, because for foreigners, Polish looks a lot like someone hiffed the Scrabble letters around and decided on the most confusing combinations!

Our first impression of the city was that it looked much like a former communist Eastern European place might look – quite boxy and functional, and a bit brusque. From the air, there are lots (and I mean streets upon streets upon streets) of unloved looking apartment blocks, but the train, which was square and aged, but toasty warm and comfy, into town also went through quite a bit of rural land, with some houses that wouldn’t have been out of place in NZ.
Once we arrived at the train station, the underground concourse was a fast and furious introduction to Poland – there is very little in the way of English signage, lots of busy locals in a hurry and wizened old people selling delicious bread rings or folk cheeses every few metres – they’re on virtually every corner, and cheap as…mmmmmm.
Our first stop was Rynek Glowny, the biggest market square in Europe, at 40,000m^2. There quite a few rather cool buildings there – the gothic Kościół Mariacki (St Mary’s Basilica) which was just stunning, with a very ornate gilt altarpiece, which we took lots of photos of. It also has two huge brick towers, the taller of which has a bugle playing a trumpet signal every hour on the hour, which stops in mid-stream to commemorate a 13^thC player who was shot whilst sounding the trumpet alarm when the Mongols invaded the city – now that’s history.
The photos are at the bottom, so if you want to skip our rambling/lecture, scroll down...
The square also has the Sukiennice (Cloth Hall) market, which was packed to the rafters with all sorts, although some of the stall holders were, ahh, abrupt… although we supposed that was just the manner of people in this part of the world.
We spent quite a bit of time eating – Polish food is awesome, and pretty cheap… my highlight would have to be the sundae from a ‘cocktail bar’, which is actually an icecream shop – how’s that for confusing?!
We saw a LOT of churches, there seems to be one in virtually place you look, and we visited most of them – methinks Kent has had about all the religious experiences he really wants now! Poland is largely Catholic, and the home of John Paul II, there are photos, posters, bunches of flowers dedicated to him and monuments celebrating him all over Krakow, it was lovely to see that the city’s Catholics are still so devoted to him.
We managed a whopping 13 hours sleep on our first night – so, not surprisingly, we were full of beans for Saturday, where we visited Kazimierz (the Jewish Quarter). Alas, I hadn’t really thought it through… as the synagogues were closed to visitors for the Shabbat – bad luck, for us, especially as the only way into the Old Jewish cemetery was through one of them… but we did climb up high to see over the walls into the New Jewish Cemetary – which was a bit of a reality check – the Nazis destroyed it during their occupation in WWII, but it was rebuilt in 1957, with a monument and some walls made of smashed bits of the headstones from the original site, I found it quite moving as most war-type things don’t feel especially real when you’re from the other side of the world, but this did.
We wandered into a market in a random square in Kazimierz, featuring china bearing the swastika, and some of the registration cards carried by the Jews during the war – nothing like seeing history to make it even more real.
We were hoping to take a bit of a cruise on the River Wisla, but for reasons unknown to us, the boats were moored and not running – grrr.
Next stop was Wawel Hill, home of a Royal Castle and Cathedral, - wikipedia tells me it has been inhabited since about 100 000BC – although the buildings there now only(!) date back to the 11th or 12^th C – and featured Kent and Eryn being kicked out of the Palace courtyard by a very angry Secret Service guy – there was some kind of diplomat who turned up unannounced while we were looking at the Royal Armoury and Treasury, this was somehow our fault and we had to make a speedy exit out a side door, being berated in Polish – great international relations!
It was then on to more churches – although I relented and suggested photos of the outside would be okay.
Click on the photo below for the whole album:

We also managed, after a few misfired conversations, to find a Polish copy of Asterix - at this rate he may need his own seat on the plane home at the end of our OE!
The final chapter involved a bit of a delay at the airport – thanks to snow closing the runway at Gatwick…Luckily the airline waited to tell us about it until we were on the plane, so we got to sit in the stifling heat with no air conditioning… coincidentally, we bought a chess set at the market, so we had a game (which Kent won, I was graceful in defeat, naturally) to kill some time. For future reference, it’s quite hard to keep the pieces upright during takeoff… although it was only my King, and Kent’s King and Queen, so it was pretty much over! The landing made the flight though, with breathtaking views of Kent (the county, not the boyfriend) covered in snow – I should be used to it by now, but you have to admit, there’s just something quite magical about snow, and I don’t think it matters how old you are, it’s just pretty!
Ooops – that was rather longer than I meant… hope you’re still awake!
Kent & Eryn x