The Lakes and The Slough

Hey Peeps.

Still getting caught up on postings. My parents are coming for a visit in two days and they'll be upset with me if I spent all my time making blogs (although they would be excited when they got home that there was lots to read).

It was Heather's b-day a few weeks ago and she really wanted to go to the Lake District. We had only briefly gone through a small patch of it on our way to Edinburgh, but it was enough to "peak"our interest in returning. It also afforded us the opportunity to test out driving on the wrong side of the road and I admit, I was a little nervous about it.

It started out a little rough at the rental agency when I had to run home and get our electrical bill to prove where we were living. I asked if we would have had a problem if we lived in Canada and they said no--but I needed to have paper evidence that I lived down the street? Lame. Anyway, we ended up with one of the smallest vehicles ever manufactured. Danny DeVito would have been big for this car. The engine was sufficient though and we set off. It was quite strange at first and that wasn't aided by the fact we might have had to drive down a few one-way streets to get out of town on the easiest route, but we managed.

The highways here are nice. They have wide lanes and no apparent speed limit. It really keeps you on your toes. Every 30 miles or so there are 'service' areas--gas stations, restaurants, and grocery stores in very strange buildings that cross over the highway. I wish I got a picture of the one we stopped at. It looked like a air traffic control tower at a really small airport.

We decided to go to a small village called Keswick, which I thought was pronounced Kess-Wick, but is actually called Kes-ick. Poor W. Always ignored.

First we stopped in Ambelside. It was not very nice.

We went to the bakery, got some take away, and had a bun and sugary treat by the river.

We took a short detour through Grassmere on the way to Keswick, but didn't stop. It looked lovely too, if not a bit sleepy. Maybe we just couldn't see into the lively restaurants with all the ivy and vines covering the windows. We did see someone who was about 43 though, so it could be classified as the most youthful town in the lakes.

The drive through the lakes was very twisty and undulating. Kind of like a giant roller coaster surrounded by green glens, peaks, and sheep. We arrived in Keswick and found our b and b easily. It was a nice place for a pretty good price. Here is the view from our window.

We went for a walk down to the lake right away. I'm not sure why, but the name of the lake is not 'Lake ______", rather is is called Derwent Water. I saw some people fishing in it, but didn't think it was a good idea that Heather went fishing all day on her birthday.

Along the way to the lake.

We hopped out of our path and found the lake to be surrounded by a large paddock full of sheep and lambs! I tried to catch one, but it just ran away from me.

It was warm, but I can see how it becomes an even better place in the summer when it really heats up. The size of the fells (hills) were surprising too--much larger than the Peak District.

After the lake we just walked around town a bit. It was kind of what I always imagined the English countryside to be.

We went out for a nice Thai dinner and headed back to the town center. We heard one crack of lightning, looked up and saw some dark clouds, and headed for shelter. This is what it looked like about 30 seconds later.

We retired quickly to a pub for a pint after that. It actually blew away just as fast at it came. We headed back  to Manchester the next morning after a proper fry-up. A great way to end a nice birthday!

The next weekend I was invited by my new softball team, the Manchester Thunder, to a weekend tournament in Slough, just outside of London. It is apparently the city where the original UK Office was set and filmed in (I've just rented it now) and possibly the hometown of Ricky Gervais, although the guy who told me that was right pissed when I was talking to him on the train at 6:30 in the morning. It's also pronounced Sss--la-ow, now Sl-ew. I had some troubles with that one.

Anyway, I've been playing for this team and really enjoying it, but have been too cheap to spring for a jersey because I'll only be playing this summer with them. I have extra time on my hands, so I thought I would just make my own jersey. I've done a bang up job, if I say so myself. I wish I had a picture to show of the 'real' jersey, but you'll just have to imagine how close it is. Also, this pic is only stage one. I managed to fill the thunderbolt with rhinestones and make a hat to go along with it.

We had a good time at the tournament, but ended up with third place (out of 21). The last game we lost was a hot contest. I shouldn't have screwed up so much. Oh well, I had a really messed up finger (I didn't break it, but thought I did!) and I pulled a muscle in my chest that still hasn't healed.

Here is some of the team:

Good Times.

Blast-er from the Past-er

I've missed this one the past two blogs. Thanks to everyone who sent me uncompromising photos of myself to include in this section, however, I have deleted them all. Permanently.

This one is just from last month, but I forgot to include it in my last blog. I really want to hire them for some sort of Barcelona mystery.

Lake District Cats!

This is Lady Beatrice. She is like most Lake District cats, just so content in life.

OK---I'm out. Parents arrive on Wednesday night (if that freakin' volcano doesn't mess things up) and off to Paris for the weekend to visit with Jeff and Helene, then off to Mallorca for a week with the fam!! I'll be really mad at Iceland if that ash come near us.

A City of Ugly People

Hi All,

It's been awhile. Nice to see you again. I didn't really know this would happen, but thought it might--I've been busy! Once summer started I've had lots to do. Granted, it is still doing fun things like softball and cooking and concerts, but I've hardly had a second to get to the ol bloggy blog. It also took a few days to get over the anger disappointment of Heather's deleted guest blog.

First, a big week for shout-outs. My oldest friend Dana is getting married. My parents had their anniversary this week. Trevor and Claudia should have their baby any minute now. Love you all!

So if you have never been to Barcelona, don't bother. It sucks. Just stay away and leave it alone. For me.

If there is one glaring problem with Barcelona, it's the pickpockets. We had read the guidebooks and seen the websites that warned us about them. I had heard similar warnings about other cities in Europe, but had never really encountered pickpockets before. When we arrived in Barcelona I did my usual practice of switching my wallet to my front pocket and swallowing my passport sealed in a ziplock bag. We got off the train at Las Ramblas. It was a full train. I hear this smack and crash, then this guy in a suit is running and grabbing this other guy. He (the suit) is coming up behind the other guy and smacks his wallet out of the other guy's hand, then grabs it off the floor. Let me explain. This is what the pickpockets do---The pickpockets (pp's) go against the traffic coming off the train. One guy causes a distraction (the crash was one of the pp's kicking the roller suitcase out of the suit guy's hand), then another one bumps into him and grabs the wallet. In this case, I believe the target had been through this before, because he didn't even try and pick up his suitcase and went straight for the wallet. The pp who took it from him was trying to pass it off to one of his partners.

So here is where the funny part starts......

We see this happen and figure out at least two of the pp's. We start walking towards the exit, except the opposite one that most of the people have gone out. There are about 20 of us. So we get to the end of the platform and it is locked---it was closed about an hour sooner. So we all turn around and start heading back to the main exit and we are with the two dudes who grabbed the wallet and they are talking to some other dudes in the group. I try to slow my pace, but they just slow down too and keep up with us. Then this security guard comes around the corner and blows his whistle and yells something in Spanish. Nobody moves....then he points his nightstick at the two dudes who we knew were pp's and also proceeds to pick out another 8-9 of them from this group of 20! So, the security guard gets us to wait, as the pp's go around the corner and the guard says "Velcome to Barcelona!" We continue around the tunnels to our transfer train and the guard ends up going a different direction. We go to this one train, I go through the turnstile first, then Jen, Jaryn and Heather's transit cards don't work and they have to go back to the machine and buy another ticket. Me? I turn around and it's the entire pp gang who we just were with! I just make sure my back is on the wall, hand in front pocket, and give a stare. They eventually get going and my gang comes along with new tickets. You also have to imagine the subway tunnels are really crowded and loud. There were a lot of people around because it was the day before the Easter weekend. Completely nutty.

We all made it out with all of our possessions to our hotel for the night. It was a little below 5 star, but not by much.

Really, it was the last hotel room in Barcelona for that night, which made it fabulous. It also made us appreciate the apartment we rented for the five days following that much more.

Our apartment was near the Sants Estacio. It was a really neat neighborhood with its own square, stores, and restaurants in abundance.

It was a rad place. We ended up having to get a three bedroom because of the Easter thing again, but the extra room was nice. It had large back courtyard, big kitchen, and two bathrooms. It was grand. I just wish agencies would provide salt and pepper when renting a full suite out. I hate having to buy it! Jerks. I'm going to give them a crappy salt and pepper review on Trip Advisor. I might give them a crappy olive oil review too.

The first day in the apartment we oriented ourselves to the downtown. We walked around the Barri Gotic (Gothic Quarter) which was wicked, a little around L'Exiample, and around Las Ramblas. Wicked. Wicked. Wicked. It was really busy, though, being Good Friday and all. I think Barcelona must get overrun with tourists in the summer---so many juicy wallets to pickpocket!



So because of all this walking around I had to pee. I was drawn to the golden arches to do it. It was, without a doubt, the busiest McDonalds that I have ever been in. It was a zoo. This is just the area to computer place your order.

This is more Barri Gotic and L'Exiample.

The next day Jaryn wasn't feeling so hot, so he took the day off to rest while the rest of us went up to Parc Guell---one of thetop places that I wanted to see in Barcelona. Guell was some rich aristocrat who became the main benefactor to Gaudi and commissioned him to do a lot of work, including building him a mansion in this major piece of land overlooking Barcelona. Guell actually never moved into it, but donated it to the city as a park. It is now one of my favorite places in Europe.

After getting so hopped on Gaudi, we did what every addict does...more Gaudi! We headed out to the apartments that he designed in the city to check out Casa Batillo and Casa Milo.

They were both fantastically amazing. We didn't pay to go in as it was pretty pricey, but they were so wicked. They only got me more hyped up for the Sagrada Familia the next day.

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I'm running out of battery and Internet time and want to finish this today, so the commentary is going by the wayside.

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I wish I had more time to talk about the Sagrada Familia. It was so cool. Unreal actually.

We did loads more in Barcelona besides looking at Gaudi architecture. Really, we did. It's a great city and I hope you all get to go there if you haven't been....just hold onto your wallet!

Barcelona Dogs!

Barcelona is not a city for cats. I saw one and it was sickly and eating a rotten scampi claw. I did see a lot of really cute small dogs and wanted to take them home with us.

This one is Blanco.

This is Son of Blanco.



OK---Later Skaters.

CC