Ship Blip!

I woke up still dreaming of cupcakes!

In fact, I decided to stop dreaming and start eating - cake for breakfast has never worried me - so padded downstairs in Sel's house, sat down at her kitchen table in my underpants, and started munching cake!

I'm not sure whether this is really the "done thing" when a guest in someone's house, but it's a mark of Sel's coolness that she didn't bat an eyelid when she arrived downstairs, properly dressed, and found me wiping cake crumbs off my chin - she was just delighted I'd spent the night dreaming of her cakes!

Shortly afterwards the Wonderspouse surfaced and I went to get dressed. Then Sel took us out for a tour of Falmouth, which was amazing. As land-locked Cotswold dwellers, the sea is incredibly exciting to us, and as a bit of a mechanical geeky type, seeing a GIGANTINORMOUS ship in the largest dry dock in the UK was incredibly exciting! Sel knows me well - she said "I thought you'd like it here"! I most certainly did!

Then she took us to a magical place almost entirely surrounded by sea where we explored, saw fabulous views out of a little castle thingy looking out to sea, watched speedboats and yachts, took pictures of each other, and got all the cobwebs blown away by the lovely sea air. There are more pictures of this outing here! We also saw the castle where Sel and Lord G got married!

Then it was back to Sel's. Lord G, who is a late sleeper, was up, and we all headed over to his Mam's for lunch. And what a lunch - a traditional Sunday roast, we'd been told, but this was a roast to end roasts. We had roast chicken, with roast potatoes AND boiled potatoes. There were also pigs in blankets, gravy made from steak (which was stunning), and (check this list out!) carrot & swede, peas, broccoli, green beans, brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower cheese, AND Yorkshire puddings! (I hope I haven't forgotten anything!) I make that "meat and EIGHT veg"! Wowee! Furthermore, there was mint jelly on the table - no matter what sort of meat, Mam provides the good condiments - the combination of cranberry sauce and brussel sprouts almost convinced me it was Christmas day!

All too soon we had to depart back to the north-east (well, relatively speaking anyway). We hugged everyone goodbye, and got into the car, eyes and tastebuds still out on stalks from the magnificence of the dinner!

We drove, and drove, and carried on driving, and carried on driving some more, and stopped just south of Bristol for a pit stop, then carried on driving a bit more and eventually got home - it took around 4 and a half hours, and was pretty much 230 miles, but what a fabulous trip. We fed and cuddled all 7 of the furry ones, called the Wonderspouse's parents to say we were safely back (having warned them we weren't going straight home from theirs), and I posted on fb to let Sel know we were home. Then we stared at the telly, ate the cupcakes we'd brought back with us from Sel's - yet more wonderful flavours and delights, and then went to bed!

And so, a wonderful visit ended. We will return though Bird! Thank you so much for having us, thank you for being such a fabulous hostess, and, er, thanks for the cupcakes from my tastebuds and tummy! ;-)

Would you believe, I actually met Selena through blipfoto? I've certainly had some trials on here, and I very nearly gave it up completely last year. However, if every other single thing about blipfoto was AWFUL (which, I hasten to add, it isn't), then the single fact that I met such a fabulous person as Sel (and Lord G and Mam too) here, makes it one of the best things I've ever done in my life. I count her among my best friends - there aren't many places I feel relaxed enough to sit in my pants eating cake before breakfast without permission - and 230 miles are nowhere near enough to keep me away from her!

We'll be back Bird! Watch out for semi-clad people getting crumbs all over your kitchen! ;-)