On Thursday Guy comes round and we start on the quiches. In our Grand Plan we’ve decided that we need to make four quiches on each Thursday until almost on top of the wedding and that will be enough.
This time we make two Three Cheese quiches, and two Tomato and Pepper. We always have more veggie quiches as we seem to know a lot of vegetarians!
On Saturday Sarah and Vincent arrive for HP3 and Guy zooms off to collect his suit from the tailor. Jo, Karen and Anna arrive too, and we’re all set. Anna has brought goodie bags for each of us with sweeties, lip gloss, hand cream, water, half bottle of champagne each and a straw – and water pistols! Mine also has a flower garland and a PINK garter…
Steve the taxi arrives and drives us in style to the canoe place, then we walk along the river bank to a field for our picnic. And, boy, what a picnic! The idea is that we’ve each brought something to share. Except we’re all bought LOTS of somethings to share – it’s a fantastic spread including potato salad, chicken, ham, avocados, olives, strawberries, stilton, tomatoes, two kinds of bread, humus, mozarella, couscous, two kinds of pecan pie, blueberries, crisps, gin and tonic in a tin (thanks, Jo!) and Anna’s champagne…
I try different ways of wearing my garland…
Note the garter round the neck by the time I acquire the hat – it’s the ‘call girl’ look…
After all that food we’re ready for action. Or not… the weather is absolutely stunning, the field is comfortable and we could just stretch out and have a snooze…
However, once we’ve filled up the water pistols and tried them on Anna for target practice, we’re ready to CANOE!
We leave most of the rest of our picnic (we’ve hardly made a dent in it) in the office, we’re kitted out with lifejackets and taken in a minibus up the river so that we can paddle back down again. We carry the canoes to the river, climb in and then we’re off! Jo and Sarah B have one canoe, and Anna, Karen and me are in the other – neither Jo nor I have done this before, so we decide it’s sensible to have one beginner in each canoe… It’s FAB! We have been told how to paddle, and how to steer and we get the hang of it quite quickly. And we’re at least going in the right direction.
Here’s one of Sarah B and Jo paddling like fury. Probably to escape our water pistols…
Karen, me and Anna in action.
There are frequent water pistol fights – our canoe has the advantage here as I’m in charge of refilling… And, yes, we do collide with each other rather a lot…
Refilling:
And…. FIRE!
About half way down the river we’re aiming at a landing point and, whilst Jo and Sarah B elegantly negotiate round the flora in the middle of the river, Karen, Anna and I head straight through it. We end up stranded, but it’s shallow, so we punt our way out.
What we haven’t realised is that the landing point takes you up a steep hill to a grassy area that is, basically, a grandstand…. So we sit and watch other people messing it up too...
The weather is absolutely brilliant – the water pistols are fantastic - being soaked is really refreshing. Although Jo, who got the wettest, might not agree!
Apart from the glorious river, we see ducklings and dragonflies, buzzards and swans…. And magical scenery. HUGE thanks to Anna for organising such a brilliant day out!
When we get home there’s just enough time for…. Another picnic!
Weight: I don’t care! I’m slim and feel really well – that’ll do for me. However, I do need to work on the scaffolding for under the frock to help fill it out a bit…
Bruises: Two corkers on my back from a bit on the canoe that rubbed. Looks like I was struck with a cattle prod. Which I wasn’t.
Hair: Everyone says it looks fine, and it’s certainly thicker. Horrible colour, but that will change on July 6th when I get it re-coloured by new salon who (hopefully) know what they’re doing.
Nails: All that canoeing, and they’re all Still Intact!! Woo Hoo!
Roses: I’ve got a ROSE! Well, two to be precise. Glamis Castle (the one with ex-black spot and a chemical habit) has produced two stunning flowers this week. And the scent? Aaah, the scent. Actually, not ‘aaah’ at all as there is Absolutely No Smell Whatsoever. Zilch. Which is a shame as that was The Whole Point of planting them… Two very nearly roses on one of the others, so hopefully better smells by next week!
And finally, just to show what a fab time we had, and the fact that we all spent the day grinning, here’s the crowd:
Sarah B:
Jo:
Anna:
Karen:
And the very happy hen:
No comments:
Post a Comment