February was a cold damp but quite lovely month for the first wife and I. There were writers meetings and real estate adventures and even some coffee project development days but as this is an adventure blog I'll stick to them. The first was the mid week day we decided that we needed a bit of a Dales tour as we hadn't been "dalesing" for some time. Gail picked out a little pub in Capel Le Dale (pronounced; kaplydle, to sort out the tourists I figure) the menue of which had be given a line of print in our local rag, The Wetherby News. As you can see from the shots below it wasn't crowded mid-week. The bar wench was lovely young and chatty though, Mum was out the back ironing and doing the cooking, Dad was in Australia holidaying with his Adelaide frends. Lunch fare was sumptuous, voluminous and most toothsome. The desserts though, recommended in our local rag with much praise, lived up to, nay, exceeded expectations.
Mine was the chocolate torte tower with raspberry jus and fresh fruit with vanilla curd buttermilk ice cream, dressed with tempered dark chocolate and sugar art. Gail's was some mango/citrus and coconut brulee with coconut ice cream and mandarin/mango/orange salad. Portions were huge and the bar wench then tempted us with home-made fudges, chocolate truffles and other boxed morsels which we bought home.
This whole day out was a delight that took some recovering from but there was little time. Although Gail was working the next day Rob G. had invited me to the Boston Spa (neighbouring village) Beer Festival. These festivals I have mentioned before, every town/village around here now holds at least one a year. There are plenty of local micro ale breweries and endless church halls, child minding centres and public buildings needing the earned funds. It is a phenomenon most recent. I think the Thorner Hall Roof fund one we went to in 2007 was the first in the area (see previous blogs) and I have been unable to keep up with them all although I do have a good collection of various festival pint glasses so I have not been remiss in my attempt to experience them. The Wetherby church tower one was a hoot in 2009 the sunny Ripon Cathederal one in 2008, I could go on, but the Boston Spa village hall one was good because of the company, the ale and the fact Gail did join us all in the local Thai restaurant after her work and all our ale ran out and we had got hungry. A great night/day. 
The shot above is Peterborough cathedral and the crowds are queuing for Flog It, a BBC antique/collectable TV show, which was being filmed when we visited. We were in Peterborough for a property experience which could take pages here so I won't. Peterborough is south of Wetherby by a couple of hours of motorway. It has a 40% London commuting population and is in the middle of a billion pound regeneration project which is seeing public grant money being spent on public space and infrastructure. This has resulted in a vibrancy not seen in areas not so lucky. It is a nice city/town and we may visit again if things work out.
February being a short month there is not much else to tell.
Oh. Gail's Mini has a bitch in a box which tells her where to go (this BMW based sat nav is so frustrating it doesn't deserve a name, while my Tom Tom's voice is an Aussie called Ken and the previous car's was happily known as Beryl, the Mini just has the bitch in the box). Anyway.... the bitch died while Gail was relying on her to navigate the seedy back streets of Manchester one ice-cold, wet, dark February night after a 16 hour day at work. It took Gail three service stations and one Chinese restaurant before she found anyone who knew where the hotel she was booked into for the night was. Not happy. We checked the Mini into the BMW service mansion and were told the car's diagnostic on-board computer showed a couple of thousand faults and needed to be killed and resuscitated on another day. Gail took the mute mini home and thanks to my Tom Tom could still get around. Turned out the bitch's antennae had water in it which of course dried out the same day the new part arrived. To be fair, there are few days here where the car gets to dry out so the new part was welcomed. All is now well but the Bitch in the box has not changed one bit.
