The Wetherby adventure ends.

It is not a surprise that after 9 years in the UK the blog entries got somewhat over run with life events. It is now the beginning of 2016 and guilt has hit this lazy blogger to make the decision.
Oh no, that's too melodramatic.
Truth is, we have been back to Australia , organised our arty stuff to come to the UK, arrived home and sold our Wetherby house and have bought a place further North, closer to our loved  Yorkshire Dales National Park.  In the smaller market town of Bedale.  Hibernian House used to be an old B&B .
All that sounds quite straight forward but let me remind myself how fraught every step was in that process.

In time I will probably have the time to start a Bedale Adventures blog but for the moment we are looking at a raft of negotiations for trades, fittings and property renovation time.
Gail has also left her job at Alliance Medical and taken on the same job with INHealth a competitor medical services company that has more jobs up North East.  I am, for the moment staying on at the Wetherby transport role as I am thinking there may be some opportunity there as Leeds Council wants to roll out the scheme I authored to other Neighbourhood network organisations.  I am proprietorial enough to want that to go well.

The new place in Bedale will take some fixing and photos and pride will form the first of my posts from there.  We will have 3 spare rooms for guests so expect to hear from friends who want to find out why we moved.

My guilt is not sufficient to say much more at this time.  I will in time link this Blog to the one I start for Bedale.  I am thinking though, blogging is so last decade.  By the time we get Bedale done there may be brain implants that allow us all to communicate without voice recognition , swiping, and thumb typing.  Technology moves so fast I'll promise to be always one trend behind.

Hope you have enjoyed the Wetherby Adventures and the adventures we have had since we have been here.  I look back over these pages and , ignoring the pretentiousness, am pleased I captured the bits I did.    Can't wait for the next ten years, can't imagine what they will hold.

2015 the 1/4ly update

Okay, No more apologies for not keeping the blog updated.  I suggest that expectations of a quarterly level of currency may also be optimistic but we'll see how this goes.

Since last I was here we have been loads of places and the usual picture trail will describe.  As an overview, we have just returned from Monaco, been for a whistle stop tour of London, and spent endless days in Middlesborough playing with little houses and students.
Gail continues to enjoy her work and as I write this she is again in prison.
My couple of days a week job is getting busier as the scheme I designed and built begins to gain popularity and our elderly users tell other elderly people.  For anyone interested, the organisation is called Wise and it has a web site. http://www.w-ise.org.uk/ .

But enough about us, on with the pictures.   Oh.  Gail is working in a prison today, she's not in prison as such, she can leave any time they let her.

So. I have just had a hunt and realised that a lot of the pictures we took over the past while, and therefore the memories, are locked in Gail's smartphone.  Gail is in prison so I can't ask her to email them to me.  They take your phone off you when you go to prison.  They are strict like that.  Anyway, these are shots from my blackberry and the now pretty-well redundant digi camera we still take with us, sometimes.

Here we are in Ramsbottom, Lancashire.  This is a wonderful little mill town and I wrote a story about our day there http://www.readwave.com/a-day-in-the-pennines_s73819  We had a delightful time walking, dining and shopping just before xmas.  These two trains are santa specials bringing people (and one Santa each) in from the west, Manchester and such places.

 For those of you who suspect the pic to the right may not be Ramsbottom, you are right .  We took more photos of Ramsbottom on Gail's phone but it has been confiscated for the period of her internment.   Yes this one on the right is London River, in Thames Valley.  We stayed at Blackfriars in a posh hotel.  We also went to the Globe Theatre reconstruction, and Canary Wharf and the London Eye and lots of other places I can't immediately recall.  We were in London for a course Gail went to and to meet our Pension Fund manager David who is trying to set up our future years.  Well, he is doing his darndest but we  doubt he can magic up a result that will support our desired non working lifestyle.  We are both 60 this year... I know I don't believe it either.  Must start working harder on our retirement plans.  But, fun comes first, right?






We did use the camera when we went on the London Eye and here is a happy shot of Gail in a pod.  The pods on the Eye are a confined space.  Sealed away from the outside world... Like a prison cell,  but with a view.

A view like this one, I took more, but everyone has seen photos of London,, so boring .

When Gail was off learning stuff I took myself to the V an A for a few hours.  A bloke could spend a year in that place.  I spent an hour looking at their history of ironwork displays.  I'm not even interested in ironwork.

Ah, Another shot of Gail in pre-prison good humour.  I snapped this while we were in the chopper on the way from Nice (That's in France, Europe. ) We went to Monaco like I said.  Its only a small place, 2.5kms long and about a km wide. Easily walkable, but we got a bus pass for two days which we hardly used.  Probably the most expensive real estate in the world and the most dense.  It's wonderful, like a real life disneyland or maybe like FARFAR AWAY LAND in Shrek.

That whitish lump thing is Mount Charles, Monte Carlo to the locals.  We learned many things in our 4 days.  Other than bonjour though, sadly, no French.  English is the master language, I am halfway between wondering why everyone doesn't speak English and deciding if I want to learn French or Spanish.

We stayed at the Fairmont.  This is their bar come dining area.  The food was great, the margaritas, sorry, white egg margaritas, no salt rim, shaken, no rocks, were the nicest in the world.  We had enough of them to get us dancing on the carpet to the piano crooner late one delightful evening.

The casino next door to our hotel was the one that saved Monaco from ruin.  It is high Rocco and sumptuous.  This was Valentines night and Gail got a rose and walked out with a 50 euro win which made the whole night a pleasantly memorable one.

 This is inside the local shopping mall.  The supermarket is in the basement and the name brands in the mall include all those chanel-gucci , hugo-hilfinger sort of fashionista places.  You know, the ones you can only go into with an invitation to buy an outfit that you can only wear once.  I would love to find a charity shop in Monaco, it would be amazingly stocked.  Didn't see  a one.

Our Hotel is on the right, this is the F1 hairpin corner on the Princess Grace bvd .  We have walked the entire circuit and will so enjoy the next grand prix TV coverage.

Our hotel's pool.  It was February, a bit too chill for a swim but we were tempted as it is heated.

Every day from our room we saw little sail boats and racing fours getting towed out, raced and towed back into the harbour.

We often, when we travel, have a light snack.  This is usually because we have over indulged previously or intend to do so.  These bed picnics take many forms but in Monaco we opted for Iberian smoked ham, mortadella, marinated vegetables, baggette, soft and hard cheeses, and the obligatory wine.  Hmmm, perhaps not such a light snack... Wonderful tho.

The following are all around the palace up in the old town

This is the side face of the Casino

These are our hotel and roof garden

 a mojito and a regular margarita.  The way a very nice night starts.

 One of the street cafe's ideal for watching the passers-by and for great and not expensive dining.  If you don't want to act like a foolish tourist or an ostentatious oligarch, you can find coffees for 2 to 3 euros, mains from 11 euros and even reasonably priced swimming  and street wear kit.  Monaco is stupidly expensive to rent or buy a home though.  7 million E for a three bed place with a view, and that's a small 3 bed only one parking space.

There is one nice beach.  They import the sand.

Some of the shops are different

casino frontage

And that is all the photos I have access to, that are worth posting.  

As far as I know, the next few months will be just us going to work,, when Gail gets out of prison,  Looking for more student let properties. Having the odd long lunch and just , you know, having a ball.  We are expecting some visitors and later this year we are going to return to Australia, for about 4 weeks, possibly for the last time ever.  It's such a long way from civilisation.

But who knows, 

We really should work at making a life plan.  If only we were not having such a good time not having a plan , we may be encouraged to make a plan.  

So that's the 1/4ly update, lets see how long before the next one.  

I will post one. 

Maybe something interesting will happen to make it worthwhile.  Keep checking in won't you?

Relax, we are still alive

I know it has been forever since I updated this blog and I have no excuse other than slovenliness.   Well thats not quite correct.  The other reason is that we have been distracted and although there have been no overseas trips or amazing adventures we have been doing, well, lots of things.

I have started a new job, a few days a week working for a council funded scheme right here in Wetherby.  I walk to work and am having a right good time.   Gail has started to do some contract MRI work for an agency and has replaced her overtime with Alliance with the agency work which she enjoys much more.  I managed to sell out of the commercial property in Singleton NSW which took some doing but has meant the stresses of long distance landlording are a thankfully receding memory.  Not to ever be out of the woods, Gail started buying little homes in Middlesbrough to let to uni students.  We now own three little multi lets one of which is fully let, the other two just finished with the builders and furnished.   If I never see another flatpack screw it will be fine by me.  

But, as usual this is a picture-driven blog and even tho we have been without camera there are things we took.  

This is a view from one of the windows in our room in the Cleveland Tontine a 16th century roadhouse where we often drop in on our way to or from Middlesbrough.  They are a nice bunch of people and do a good food spread.   It is also very close to the Mt Grace Priory.  We went to the priory to see an outdoor play.  A Sherlock Holmes adventure.  The Tontine provided us with a hamper of grand proportions with all the trimmings, and champagne, the chairs are ours.

Some attendees got more into the spirit than others.
Everyone was in fine mood and good humour.  The cast and crew spent time among the audience prior to, during and after the play.

The Priory  presents rather well on approach

and expands to the ruins once through the side gates.

The ruins were the ideal backdrop for the actors and the show was a rollicking harbour-side mystery that borrowed cleverly from the stones and mortar.

Another day saw us re-visit other ruins, well we really returned to visit the pub opposite the National Trust's Byland Abbey ruins.  I object to paying to walk into a field of stones so we have never walked the abbey ruins.  The menu regrettably has returned to a National Trust level of service and food as the previous excellent restaurateurs failed to negotiate an ongoing commercial deal with the Trust.  So the great food has left the great place.  Shame.

Middlesbrough is known as Captain Cook's birthplace, and is home of the design of the Sydney Harbour bridge.  It shows this history by its own collection of fine river crossings.  This one is the Transporter Bridge.  You drive on to a road platform which lifts you up and tracks along the overhead rails, lowering you again to land on the other side of the river.  It is back in service after a lottery funded repair and overhaul.  Looks amazing and as soon as we can we are taking the ride.

House guests John and Sara took advantage of us in October and among the many places we visited was the Timble Inn ,  Sawdays recommended eatery in the Yorkshire moors , about 30 minutes from Wetherby.  It was our first visit but nice place and good food..

I said we were now landlording in the UK.... This is one of the houses Gail found to buy for student letting.  It now has a sparkling new front door, all new walls and a glistening kitchen, new carpets and furniture, glistening bathroom and fancy lights throughout.  With its new paint outside too, we can't wait for the happy tenants to move in.

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To close off this little update I'm including a few shots of a side trip we took from Middlesbrough to Helmsley along the North York Moors escarpment.  Oh, did I say I'd bought a toy car, its a little Msport BMW and yes, a convertible, takes me back to my MGB days... We have been grinning stupidly, top down,  at the countryside all this summer which has allowed us many a fine day's tootling.

 The destination was not Helmsly but a stop a few miles before it, a three hat Michelin restaurant specialising in game cooking.  It is a restaurant in a residential pub perched in a tiny town called Hawnby.  Hawnby comprises ten homes, a B&B, a post box and phone booth.  And an amazing restaurant.    We had the grouse.... if we have now had the world's best grouse, then I am no fan of fresh killed local grouse.

Still, the surrounds were spectacular, and the service was low key Yorkshire country friendly.


I will try really hard to post more of our adventures and to remember to take the camera out more.  Maybe when we both upgrade our phone contracts we may have easier access to capture images, if we remember to do so, the blog is often the last thing on our minds.


See ya soon.