R and I went for a trip to the National Trust house of Greys Court on a bright and sunny day. Today was a little warmer than we’ve been used to, so very pleasant. Yes more days without rain, but with a cool Northerly wind. The fields were very hard and dry. We visited to see the bluebells, unfortunately, they were not quite their best, but another week and they should be. The formal gardens were looking very pretty. We took a long slow walk across the fields to the bluebell woods, eating our Cornish Pasty lunch on some old decaying logs. Back at the house we managed our second cup of tea, served a great deal faster than our morning coffee.
This was also the longest trip in my new electric car. No need for range anxiety as the return trip was only 64 miles, giving an estimated range of 237 miles.
The cafe in the Tesco at Bicester is so much better than the cafe in the Aylesbury Tesco. The Bicester Tesco has cooked breakfast, ideal for morning sustenance while Rosemary is doing the weekly shop. They recently launched their vegan breakfast which comprises two vegetarian sausages, half an avocado, baked-beans, mushroom, tomato, toast and some steamed green leaves (spinach??).
The breakfast took a long time arriving, much longer than a traditional breakfast. I assume this was because the food had to be prepared fresh, and not from a range of food already prepared, or at least cooking on already hot griddles.
So what did it taste like?
The sausages were fine, avocado was good, spiced with some black pepper. Beans, can’t go wrong. The mushroom and tomato could have booked cooked longer with more oil. The toast was OK. The steamed green leaves were bitter and not at all nice.
Would I have this again? No, the cooked standard breakfast was so much nicer than this. I don’t have an issue with vegan foods, just I don’t think you should try and make a pretend English breakfast from vegetable ingredients. Some hummus and toast would have been so much better.
(In case anyone is thinking what a swine I am to be eating while R is food shopping, I should say I go with her blessing. In fact, she positively herds me towards the cafe. Apparently, I become irritating if I walk around with her. (So you know what to do, chaps…..)
We met Andrea, Richard and Jon at Claydon House. After we arrived, we all walked to the cafe and had a quick meal, before having a tour of the house. Much of the house was under repair because of serious cracks in the ceilings. Furniture had been removed and stored in other rooms. It was likely to become worse before getting better. After the tour, we went home for supper and copious amounts of whisky.
Saturday we met up with Ravi and Simon, plus his daughter & her family. We found Ravi, Simon and family in the Peoples Vote March. I heard Caroline Lucas giving a supportive Remain talk. There were a few leave people giving the Remainers a hard time.
Afterwards, we went to the Branca Restaurant for a good lunch and then a walk around University Park.
Today was a lovely bright and not overly cold day, so off we set to RSPB Otmoor to check out the Starlings. Would we recognise our local Starlings as they came in to roost in the reed bed! We arrived at around 2.45, the car park was already full, bar one space for us. We headed out slowly looking for birds. To be honest, there were not many around, the scrapes were empty. The walk to the reed bed is around 1500-2000 meters. There are several viewing points, we chose one a little bit further on, where there should be a few fewer people.
Shortly after sunset the Starlings started to arrive and did their murmuration bit. Interesting how small groups of birds had to join in with the big group before going in to roost. Once roosted there were large waves of starlings flying over the tops of the reeds as they moved around to other locations.
As we were leaving we saw a green flash in the sky, fairly low down and travelling North. The trail was very short, and it seemed to travel slower than a meteor, and faster than a sattelite. The short trail was also quite wide. It was visible for a couple of seconds. No idea what it was.
Rosemary and I had a trip to Oxford today. Parking virtually impossible in Oxford, so you have to use the Park and Ride. Being retired, the cheapest and easiest way into Oxford is to park at the Bicester Park and Ride which is free. Then catch the S5 into Oxford, yet again free with your bus pass, and they supposedly run every 15 minutes. The website shows you live arrival times of buses, ours was a tad late.
In the city of Oxford, we went straight to the Library where there was an exhibition of books and magazines. The Bodleian is a copyright library so receives most publications from the UK. These included erotic publications, some of which were subsequently banned. The access to these publications was restricted and categorised as Phi. Students could see them for research purposes only with a written note from the Director of Studies. Most of the books displayed in the very public area were very tame, you could hardly believe any of them would have been banned in the UK.
Once Banned Books
Next was the business of the day shopping, clothes shopping. Having spectacularly failed at this, it was time for lunch at the Cinnamon Kitchen, an upmarket Indian Resturant on the upper floor of the Westgate shopping centre. There are several restaurants up on the roof. Many with outside seating for warm days. A token gave us a free glass of bubbly and we had a fine meal.
After lunch we had a look around John Lewis. They were still doing their Black Friday sale, and all the Google Equipment was matching the online Google prices. So tempted to load up with a few more Google Home Speakers. I was also looking for active noise cancelling headphones for travel. I did learn a couple of things though. Noise cancelling means two things, Noise cancelling can apply to microphones in the headphones enabling the other party to hear you above background noises, or it can be to remove the noise of the environment from the music you are listening to. Be warned, it’s not obvious when you look at the devices. Most of the headphones on display were not working (battery flat), and to pair your Bluetooth phone to the device was nigh impossible, you had to find the device, and I have never seen so many Bluetooth devices available for paring on my phone.
Well after this, it was home time, but we had to go to the sweet shop for some aniseed balls. These were purchased at Hardys Sweet Shop on the High Street. It is so much further down the road than we ever imagine. We always believe we have gone past, and the shop has closed. Aniseed balls purchased for Rosemary. I won’t touch them now after a large dentist bill to replace a cracked tooth; I tended to crunch them up with my teeth.
