Cheltenham housesitting and catching up

 A busy, but not all exciting week.

Brians family. LtoR: Jackie, Becky (middle granddaughter), James (Son-in-law to be), Jenny (youngest granddaughter), Fiona (daughter) and Brian. James, Jenny, Fiona and Brian have birthdays ranging from 15th August to 5th September so it was a multiple celebration 

Memories for Jackie on Cleeve Common

Sunday, after the last blog, we walked up onto Cleeve Common. We were surprised to find sheep in the carpark, but didn’t manage to get them through the gate onto the common, they trotted off up the path.... Fortunately as we got to the communications masts at the top we saw a warden. I assumed someone else would have told him, but apparently not, so having convinced him, that, no, they were not on the Common, yes, they were in the carpark, off he rushed. 

Nice view of Cheltenham from the top. The racecourse is the green patch on the right

The sheep after they'd been herded back onto the common

The masts brought back all sorts of memories, Cleeve Common being one of the standard mid-points, we used (B: 'we' being when she was a BBC engineer), back in the day, when outside broadcasts were all transmitted by ‘line of sight’ microwave link. I didn’t go up there very often, but I do remember one of the riggers letting me drive one of the OB (B: Outside Broadcast for those of us not in the know!) lorries on the Common, and being in our van out of sight of the gate when some delightful people torched a car! Fortunately it was out by the time the OB had finished and we could leave! Having

Cleeve Hill summit trig point (330m asl)

walked down memory lane we turned round to return to the house. We were shortly overtaken by someone on a quad bike - “that’ll be the farmer” I said, and so it as. We met the ranger again coming the other way, grateful for the heads up, they’d rounded up the sheep!

Monday, up to Alvechurch, MOT for Ted, and pop into the garage in the village to ask about the car. Booked it in for Thursday to replace the spark plug, a common fault apparently. Fortunately we could make this coincide with Ted going back in to get his aircon repaired. The fault had been found, but needed a part!

Manu and Crystal's visit to us in Cheltenham

I went to see Sarah, which was lovely, sitting in the garden, joined by John while Brian messed about with all these vehicles! Late lunch with mum before back to the house. Our first online Monday Club, was much better than we expected, it actually worked very well. It was good to catch up with Tim, Mark and Bill.

Tuesday Manu and Crystal popped over, they wanted to say hi, and fancied a meal in the Thai restaurant Bangkok Kitchen in Cheltenham that we ate in last week. Well that was a hardship for us! We did try a walk around Cheltenham, but it was so hot we said our farewells and headed off to the cool of Morrison’s! A recce was called for, we’d been invited to Fiona and James for Saturday as it was Fiona’s Birthday. Lovely, Fi however had studied the weather, and the forecast for Saturday was probably not BBQ suitable. Would I do a paella for her birthday? Yes, as long as I could get good prawns and fresh mussels....

Manu and Crystal are, shall we say, height challenged and we take every opportunity to emphasise it (in the nicest possible way!). Here they are standing next to a giant thistle in one of Cheltenhams parks

The storm approaches to cool the mid 30's temperatures

Wednesday we chilled, or actually baked, it was ridiculously hot again. I did feel sorry for the gardener! It was so hot, the Aga went out, in some ways a relief, but not when you hadn’t noticed and wanted to boil some water! We stood outside watching the threatened storm approaching, feeling the wind get up. It was fab.

Thursday back to get the vehicles both sorted out. Relatively painless, except to the bank balance.... good to have lunch with mum though. Back via Morrison’s, fortunately managing to get the last bag of mussels, as I’d been ringing all day to reserve, but they are not answering!

Jackies paella main course

Jenny cake for dessert

Friday morning was spent prepping....steaming the mussels, marinating the chicken, chopping the veggies, squid and chorizo. All well worth it, we arrived at Fiona’s on Saturday, just having to cook! They had gone all out, little tapas to start, Spanish music, and James mixing up sangria. All followed by birthday cake made by Jenny. James’ mum popped in to say hi and was sent away with the leftovers, so my paella for four fed seven, who says I overcater? But what a lovely day.

Fiona and Jenny pose for photos while Jackie cooks the paella and James prepares the starters

Then Becky turned up with presents for Fiona

Sunday Iain from Bristol had suggested that we meet them, and Helen and Ian at Purton, a tiny place on the banks of the River Severn where they had beached a number of boats to prevent further erosion of the river bank and stop it ‘breaking in’ to the canal. We had a pleasant couple of hours walking with H&I and Monty dog, before being joined by Iain and Bev and going to a local pub for Sunday lunch.

Today was another trip to Leamington Spa to visit the Financial advisor, most odd to sit through a meeting for an hour and a half wearing a mask, but all is good. We are rapidly ticking off jobs and lovely socialising which is good as still being very unsure what is going on with the world, and not wanting to make any long term plans we have invited ourselves back up to Nicky and Tony in Scotland! I did give them opportunity to say no, but they seem happy to have us.

Helen's selfie photo of a Sunday walk to see Purton Hulks with Helen and Ian

Now this we (Brian and Ian) thought was really interesting at Purton, this beached ship is  made of concrete. It was one of 39 vessels built during the second world war in 1941, 6 of which are now beached here. They were built as a prototype for the Mulberry Harbour, which were floating concrete structures towed across the English Channel on D day 1944 and sunk to make a temporary harbour for landing equipment. Bits of the Mulberry Harbour are still visible today in Normandy, France (we visited last year and wrote a blog entry on it). These ships were used as barges and were beached here in 1965. You can read more about this one, FCB75 and the others here: https://www.nationalhistoricships.org.uk/register/2420/fcb75

I think there's 4 of the concrete ships in this photo

This is the original lock gate entrance to the Sharpness to Gloucester canal from the Severn estuary. Its now closed off and a larger, more modern entrance made further downriver 

We also thought this was interesting: See that round stone construction up ahead on the left and a flat stone construction on the other side of the canal? They were the piers of Severn Railway Bridge that was built in 1879 and crossed the canal and the River Severn (off to the left). It was built to bring coal into Sharpness dock and had 21 spans on cast iron columns but, on 25th October 1960, in thick fog and a strong tide, two barges carrying petrol and oil missed the harbour entrance and were carried upstream towards the bridge. One collided with the bridge, the other was pushed on top of her by the tide. The collision caused two bridge spans to collapse, rupturing a gas main and electric cables. There was a huge explosion and the barges burst into flames, fire spreading across the river. Only 3 of the 8 crew survived. It was not economically viable to rebuild the bridge so it was demolished.

A photo of the original bridge

And those wrecks you can see are the remains of the two barges, the bridge originally crossing above where they are

On the Sharpness canal. What do you think - good photo?

Bev and Iain joined us for lunch at the Lammastide Inn

And here's Bev's photo just to show Brian was there too

Here's a few photos from the house we're housesitting in. A family of horses  that we can see in the field beyond the garden fence

Mr. Pickles and Nellie cats are the best of friends

Last night Nellie cat came onto Brians lap for more than half an hour wanting cuddles, snuggles and stroking

I like this photo taken through the kitchen window of the bird feeder. They are, Blue Tits (I think) and I like the one on the right peering round

Another photo taken through the window. My guess is a Chaffinch, but I stand to be corrected!

A pheasant clearing up the sunflower seeds dropped from the birdfeeder by the smaller birds

Wasn't sure if this was a young pheasant, a female pheasant of a young female pheasant

Two sleeping pussy cats on our bed one morning

Have a look at this short video of two pussy cats playing