Just as we reached Besancon we had a phone call from England saying Val's brother Alan had been admitted to hospital so we had to do a quick turn round back to St Jean & England. With help from John on Whistling Mouse running Val to the booking office before it closed & Said from Avesol who took us to Dijon in the very early morning we made it to Enland in record time & had a last week with him before he died. The funeral was held at this very pretty church just down the road from the Pub he & Vicky had just taken on. He would have been amazed at the number who came from all over the country to pay their respects - the church was full & the car park overflowing!!
As our return tickets were not till June we made the most of our time visiting family & friends. A lovely Sunday was spent with Julian & Jill & as an added bonus Andrea & Ian called round too. Richard is obviously a budding gardener watched by brother Will while I am not sure if Julian was sleeping or if its his comment on Mike's hair. I told him to send a better photo if he didn't want this published!!!
Couldn't keep away from boats so spent an afternoon on Southend pier watching the inshore lifeboatmen showing off their skills - including throwing a crewman overboard so they could rescue him
Next stop was Yorkshire where we stayed with Guy & Helen for a few days. It was Vals 60th birthday so we had a lovely meal with them all & also Sam & Peter - as you can see from the photo of Guy & Jacob lots of wine was drunk!
We also had time to watch Rose having her riding lesson. Guy is having them too in an effort to stay ahead of her.
Later we went to see Sam & all her animals, the guinea pigs had just had babies Sam didn't even know about them! She then showed how it should be done on Peter's horse while he got on with building a new back deck.
Last stop was to North Yorkshire to visit Geoff & Eileen -old friends from before we bought the boat. We had a pleasant day at Flamborough Head - although it was sunny just inland the mist was thick on the headland & not too warm - a typical english summer day!!
We also saw several puffins on the cliffs, they nest in holes in the ground not like the gulls who seem to lay their eggs just on the rock face.
Finally back in Brentwood we watched the big cycle race - like a mini Tour de France. They closed the main road through town for the day & in sweltering heat the bikers circled round & round for over an hour each race.
We decided to have a day in London before we returned to France - having had a bad experience with the local trains last time we tried to go in to get a morning eurostar! Having decided this we then thought about a show & ended up doing the job properly by having dinner at the Ritz then going to see Phantom of the Opera. At the end of the meal we were too full & hadn't time for the petit fours so Val suggested to the lovely french waiter that they would be ideal for the interval at the show. No problem -a doggy bag was provided - rather a posh one as shown!!!
