Cotswolds

What a weekend! How much can you cram in? Well, let's see. I took the train to Guildford on Friday to meet up with Nicole and Rob, who had dinner waiting...awww. We then drove to Rob's parents' house in Shipton in the Cotswolds. Ship, for sheep. It's a beautiful little village. Rob's parents were waiting for us, and they are really, really lovely. We sat up talking for a long time in their gorgeous back yard, sorry, garden, at first with wine and beer. But then we switched to the homemade sloe gin. Gin, sloe berries, and sugar. Boy does that stuff go down easy! Too easy. It's very alcoholic and very tasty and I had way too much, which I paid for the next morning. But well worth it. Mr. Brown works for the British version of the NSA (I can't remember the initials for the British one), and took off early the next morning for Washington DC to spend two weeks working with his counterparts. But Mrs. Brown and Smedley the cat kept us company over the weekend. On Saturday, after a nice lie-in, we hit the road for a couple of Cotswold hot spots. We first went to Bourton-on-the-Water, where among other things we witnessed a rubber ducky race on the river. We drove through Stow-on-Wold (wold meaning hill), and then stopped at a beautiful little village called Bibury just as a gigantic thunderstorm hit. I have great pictures of Arlington Road, and was really appreciating the town for its lack of tourists, when the thunder started and the skies opened up, and we got drenched. So we headed for a nearby pub Rob knew of, but they had lost power and so were not serving food. We waited out the worst of the storm with pints of Stowford Press, the best cider I've tasted yet, and then raced back to Rob's house to get dressed for the evening. Rob loves to open up on country roads that are only big enough for one car, and let me tell you, from the passenger seat, it's even more fun when you've had a pint of cider!! I was loving it! Maybe even better than a rollercoaster. Saturday night we went to a house party/30th bday- a brother of a good friend of Rob's. I met tons of people and had a pretty British experience- although I must say it reminded me a lot of an American BBQ or backyard summer party as well. I played croquet (I'm not bad a'tall) and badminton and got very competitive (US beat UK!), games in the pool too. We had kebabs on the grill (the bab prounced as if you're saying the first half of the word babble, NOT pronounced as bob) and strawberries and cream, I drank Pimms till I was delirious and having a bit of difficulty with the croquet mallet, and heard British slang like "innit" as in, "It's really grand the weather cleared up for the party, innit?" and skinted, and more. Everyone was really warm and friendly and I had an awesome time. I mean, it was ace! Hmmm, yeah, I could live here :) Maybe 6 months really is the magic number.

Today we did some sightseeing around a town called Winchcombe. We had cream tea, checked out the gargoyles and grotesques at the cathedral and wandered around a bit. I learned about the Jurassic limestone escarpment the Cotswolds are built on from Rob. We then had a BBQ in the backyard of Eldersfield (Rob's parents' house) where I had another jug of Pimms (beginning to see a pattern here), and I think I may have accidentally adopted a little kitten who may show up here in another week or two- oops. Another story there which I'll relate if she shows up. For now, I'm exhausted from still being jet-lagged and from all that partying and touring...thankfully we did get a break from the heat. Couple of pics for you...