Nothing to report- Friday/Sat 27-28 October

Well Noel started suffering in a big way with his cold on Thursday and struggled through Friday but is slowly improving-thank god, and he's hopeless when sick.

So nothing to report until we start our life again tomorrow

Update Sunday Lunchtime

Well the above is not entirely correct. As a result of not feeling great what with colds etc, we have started to do a long walk after breakfast each morning. The walk lasts up to two hours and we are covering between 3 and 4.5 miles depending which way we go and how often we stop, which is not much.

All of the walking has been carried out round the Meadow Estate and over the past few days we have appreciated even more this place. It’s a huge area covering 1600 acres, 90 lakes of varying sizes and all of the apartments or houses overlook a lake or a part of the gold course. There are 54 fairways or 3 golf courses, a tennis and fitness club. There is 12 miles of walking paths, a football and separate baseball pitch and children playground and a heath centre for the ageing population. Anyway it’s been a great place to stay and we are pleased that our neighbours Clive and Heather have allowed us to use the apartment. Lets hope by Sunday we have gotten over our colds etc.

The sun continues to shine in this state most of the time and we would certainly return here next year and take advantage of this great weather, perhaps we could become ‘Snowbirds’.

Yesterday afternoon we went to the ‘Target Superstore’ on University Parkway, it’s a great store but we noticed that most of the food they sell is pre-packaged ready made meals rather than fresh food, makes you think how much paper and packaging waste there must be.

Watched TV last night and they had on two good films, Men in Black and Shawn of the Dead

It was of course full of adverts but you have to live with this if you live here. Anyway enough of this rubbish, we are planning trips to Venice and Naples next week, both places are South of here and we have briefly visited them before and would like to spend some more time there. We also wish to Sanibel Island which is a very nice nature reserve.

See you tomorrow as we are off to down town Sarasota for some shopping.

Wednesday 25th October, It’s getting warmer again

Well that was the end of the cold front for the moment, it lasted perhaps 1.5 days and today the temperature got back to about 85°F. We decided that today we would explore Sarasota Town and also Siesta Key and see what it was like. Sarasota is a very quiet town at the moment as the hoards have not yet arrived from the frozen North. The town is quite small really however we parked near to ‘Marina Jacks’ and then headed up by the waterfront on to a promenade which goes in to the middle of the bay. There is a lovely statue of Dolphins and you can see the pictures in the photo blog.
However, Shock and Awe we discovered that in fact Sarasota was founded by the Scottish and they were also quite involved for many years in running this town, they also built the first golf course in the United States of America here in down town Sarasota. Those wiley Scots!
We then headed in to the town and walked up Main Street, this is full of mostly empty restaurants but there were many antique and also fine art shops together with some really lovely pottery and glass outlets.
There were also a number of interesting statues around town, mostly of clowns, which are pictured.
We ended up in the most amazing food mart where the presentation of the fruit and vegetables was magnificent and the quality was quite superb. They also had a lunch outlet where you could purchase sandwiches of all descriptions and a selection of hot and cold food to make a Londoner go mad with jealousy. Oh how I miss the K+N Colnbrook Sandwich Bar - YUK.
Following our walking tour of the town we headed out to Siesta Key where we had lunch and found an Internet Café to connect and to check mail etc. This area is full of developments of new houses, apartments and condo’s and the most obvious sign everywhere was ‘For Sale’ or ‘For Rent’. There must be some good deals around at the moment with the amount of houses and condo’s for rent. Siesta Key is a very nice area and quite expensive looking in places and would be a great place to live, providing you wanted to live in Florida.
Again it was very quiet with very few cars and people but it will get busier after thanksgiving and thereafter for the next few months. This was a pleasant day’s travel and we headed back via one of the large shopping malls, had a quick look round and left without spending a cent, brilliant.
Last night we had one of Costco’s great New York Sirloin steaks, how they get such good quality at such a good price is amazing anyway tonight its Crab Cakes, should be interesting.
Not sure what we will do tomorrow, perhaps go to the Antique Car Museum or a wildlife area.

Enjoy the photos on the Photo Blog

Monday/Tuesday 23/24 October

Monday was a slow day for both of us due to our suffering somewhat from colds. So not much to report apart from a little bit of shopping, reading and checking emails etc.
On Tuesday the weather changed and became a little cooler and much better for us as we could turn off the air conditioning completely. It’s dropped from around 90 degrees F to about 70 degrees F so we decided to go for a walk through The Meadows to get a better idea of our surroundings. It was a very nice walk indeed of about three hours duration along to the Country Club and back via the shopping village. We stopped and watched some of the golfers and realised that this is not a sport if you want some exercise. It’s about 20/30 paces from the Car Park to where you pick up your electric caddy car and then you are off. At each hole you get out of you little car and walk two paces to hit the ball and another two paces back, times 18 holes that is around 36 paces, and then you drive to where the ball landed and here you may have to walk more and this depends how good a golfer you are. So this could be anywhere between 4 and 10 paces and so after all the 18 holes you may, if you are lucky, only walked about a couple of hundred yards. Then it’s back to the golf club and racing the other carts back so that you can get a place near the bar where you won’t have to walk too far either. Am I being unfair to golfers??? I don’t know but looking at most of the overweight golfers that we saw I think this is a fair and accurate impression.
Anyway the walk through The Meadows was very nice indeed and in fact the place should be called The Lakes. We walked quite a few miles and saw some very attractive views and also many birds and flowers. This estate has been laid out extremely well and every house has a lake view.
So now it’s off to the shops to sit outside the KIVA JUICE BAR, as they are the guys with free wireless internet connections near to us, so that we can send and check our emails and update this blog.

See you all tomorrow.

Sunday 22nd October 2006

Quite a slow start really, 9.30 am actually, and we had decided to go to St Armand’s Circle (roundabout to you Brits) to have a good American breakfast. It’s still early in the Florida season and so quite a few of the restaurants were closed but we found a place where we had to wait for 25 minutes, but it was worth the wait. The sun was shining and Noel was beginning to feel the effect of the late night and also seemed to be getting Jennifer’s cold. We did a slow walk around the circle and looked at the shops and then Adrian and Joyce headed home to complete their upgrading of their apartment.

We continued to look around the shops for a while but it was getting hot and when you are suffering from a cold the heat does not go well with it.

The Circle at Sarasota is a very nicely laid out area with some great shops selling everything from antiques to watches to some really good glassware and knick knacks. A nice place to visit, if only the breakfast had not been so large we would have hit the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream parlour. We took a slow drive back to the apartment as by this time Noel had a sore throat which was as good a sign that a cold was on the way.

We hope to visit the Antique car museum later this week and also several other attractions. However the single biggest attraction is the weather, it is very hot in summer but very nice in winter when the ‘snow birds’ arrive. Snow birds are people who live in Northern USA/Canada who come down to escape the harsh winters and they rent apartments for months or arrive down in their battleship size RV’s (recreational vehicles ) which is a good name as you could put Weybridge Recreation Park in to some of these vehicles.

It was a very nice weekend and so we spent a quiet evening in the apartment watching the television adverts which were continually interrupted by programmes.

Saturday 21 October- A beautiful day

Jennifer is still suffering from a cold, no doubt caught on the flight over, and so we have been a little slow doing things over the past week but we hope to make up for it this weekend.

In the morning we went shopping for some speakers for our I-Pod so that we could listen to our own music. We ended up in Walmart with a JBL set which works quite well. In the afternoon our friends Adrian and Joyce arrived down from Indian Shores as we were all going to the Clearwater Yacht Club function on Saturday night at ‘Marina Jacks’ a popular local watering hole, this event takes place every year. Those with boats sail or power down the coast from Clearwater to Sarasota and tie up in the Marina. Other members of the club who don’t come down by boat are known as the Land Cruiser group as they drive down.

Marina Jacks is right in the middle of the harbour and surrounded by boats costing a few million bucks I guess and certainly a little bit larger than our boat ‘Piplin Two’ which is about 8 feet long.

It was a very nice evening and we were made to feel most welcome, the party had a disco at the end of the evening and so we rocked the night away, well until 10pm when the music stopped.

The tables had eight places and the couple next to me were very nice although we could not see eye to eye on how clever and brilliant Tony Blair is. He thought the General in charge of the UK armed forces should be shot for treason!, following his recent comments about the war in Iraq, at this stage it seemed safer to go back to the merits of English football.

Anyway a nice evening in a great location, we will go back again for a drink one evening.

Friday 20 October 2006 Weybridge

Well we went for a longish walk around the estate today trying to avoid the alligators and the golfers, who kept shouting fore- or do they mean four. The Estate covers I think about 160 acres and is created in amongst several golf courses with a mixture of apartments, small and large houses. All very tastefully laid out.
Our walk took through the houses and via the large amount of lakes where birds, and alligators, vie for the food. Its all very green and very attractive. We took a few photos, which are now on the photo blog. And then it was time for lunch and a small afternoon siesta, its really hard in the tropics.
In the afternoon a quick visit to the bank and also some shopping and to check emails etc. There is a small shopping mall where there is a juice bar which provides free internet access and so we could update the Blogs. Its very warm at the moment with the temperature around 90 degrees Fahrenheit and so we are doing limited walking and wait for a bit cooler weather and when we have got rid of our jet lag.
Our friends Adrian & Joyce will be coming to Sarasota tomorrow and we wil join them for a night at the Clearwater Yacht club event being held here, About 20 boats from Clearwater will make the trip down to Sarasota and we will join the crews for an evenings entertainment at Marina Jack, a well known local dive.
Florida is a very flat state with lots of water and the occasional hurricane!!!, however what with the amount of new condo’s being built and also the heavy increase in the cost of Home insurance there some good deals to be done. When looking in a local real estate shoppee’ we found a house with about 4200 sq feet, a private lake or pond of about an acre, plus a load of other space for about GBP 350 K. Not bad really, we might go an take a look next week just to see if the info is correct. The traffic in this area of Florida is quite good compared to the Weybridge in Surrey and so over the next week we will explore the beaches and all other areas surrounding Sarasota.
In the meantime I hope you like some of the photos from the Weybridge Florida community

Thursday 19th October- Off to Sarasota

We have rented an apartment in Sarasota from friend’s who live in Wey Road near us. So we headed down the coast and one and a half hours later arrived at our destination- Weybridge.

Yes, the apartment is in an area called Weybridge and was built by Taylor Woodrow a UK based company and also the areas and street names are English street names and so we feel very much at home. The apartment is a very nice two bedroom/bathroom overlooking a lake which has an alligator and many birds, see photos. So swimming in the lake appears to be out and as I do not feel like another Steve Irwin (RIP) we shall stay away. Interesting enough, on the news last night was a story about two fishermen off the coast of Sarasota. They were in their small boat and in jumped a stingray and promptly panicked both the animal and fisherman and so the stingray barbed one of the guys right through the heart, similar to Steve, only this time the fisherman did not try to pull it out and his went to hospital where the surgeons actually pulled the barbed end through the heart rather than pull it straight out, This guy is still alive although critical. Its amazing really that this type of attack never happens then suddenly in the space of a few short weeks it’s happened again!

I digress, in the afternoon we did some shopping; there is a small mall about two/three miles away with some good shops. Dinner that night was a shared New York Sirloin steak, these steaks are bigger than I thought, and they are 16 ounces each. The cook was Chef Noel and I can safely say it was the best New York Sirloin I think I have ever tasted. We have a few left so if anybody fancies a steak in Sarasota, give us a call.

Tuesday/Wednesday 17/18th October

Well the flight over was pretty much OK, the BA 777 was quite full however the crew were good and the food not too bad at all. We were met at Tampa Airport by Adrian and then headed off to their Condo by the sea in Indian Shores. A couple of nightcaps later we were off to bed after watching Adrian’s new Philips 50 inch Plasma HDTV television. What a great machine this is.

On Wednesday we did a long walk along the beach but as it was quite hot and we were jetlagged we headed back via an ice cream parlour. Referring back to the Jet lag bit, as we were walking along the road from Adrian Condo we passed by some workers who were digging a hole right next to an electricity pole. As they dug deeper they suddenly found the bank caving in and they had to get out of the hole pretty damn quick to avoid being buried. At the same time the pole began to tilt towards the road. They suddenly realised what was happening and went to get a JCB type digger and tied a chain around the pole to steady it. And then they all stopped work and started scratching their heads wondering what to do next. All this was talking place whilst I was holding my camera and did not take a single photo of this event.

The afternoon was spent visiting a local COSTCO stores to pick up some supplies for our stay in Sarasota, we do like this retailer as their meat is excellent. In the evening we went with Adrian and Joyce to the Clearwater Yacht Club for a Greek Evening. The food was extremely good and after an ouzo and wine we bid farewell and headed home for bed.

Doesn't Time fly

Well its been a fairly busy week and we start to get ready for our trip to Florida. We are leaving on Tuesday 17Th for three weeks, spending part of the time at Indian Shores, then Sarasota and finally at the Holiday Inn Hotel in Clearwater (which is unlike any other Holiday Inn you have seen). The journey is planned to enable us to join our friends at a Birthday party in early November to celebrate Joyce Jenkyns birthday, age information is held secret. We will update our Blogs with our travels and exploits over the next few weeks.







Anyway, last Friday night we were invited by our friends in Wey Road, Toni & Gerry to go to an opening night of a new David Lloyd Restaurant chain that was offering a fresh approach to high quality take away food at a location in Richmond. The chain is known as Dinners Made which is an idea taken from an American chain called Dinners Done. The idea behind this concept is that you order you menu on the Internet then arrive to prepare the food and then take home the finished product and cook. The staff will help you prepare the vegetables and provide advise on cooking procedures whilst they will have partly prepared the vegetables in advance for you. They also have a restaurant and bar where you can eat a drink to your hearts content, which is exactly what we did. As Gerry's company provide the meat we all tried the steaks and chops which were truly excellent. So even if you do not want to go to the hassle of preparing your own dinner, to eat there is fine and with a great atmosphere.
It was good evening for the wine producers of France as they received an unexpected bonus as a result of our efforts. for more information go to http://www.dinnersmade.co.uk/

On Saturday night we joined some friends at their home in Reading. These were Noels ex business colleagues and it was a great night reminiscing about people and places. The discussions covered everything from how bad the Blair (ites) were/are to the current immigration policy (or lack of one)
Rogers Cassoulet was excellent and we thoroughly enjoyed the evening but it was rather late as we got home about 2.30 am, a bit late for us old ones. As a result Sunday was a slow day.

Spamalot- A great new London Show

Earlier this week we went in to the 'smoke' to see a performance of the new London Show called 'Spamalot' written by Eric Idle of Monty Python fame.
The show originally opened in New York last year to great acclaim and now it has finally reached London in all its glory. Tim Curry is excellent as the King and the rest of the cast. are brilliant. The story is very loosely based on King Arthur and the search for the Holy Grail. It jumps time zones in a brilliant manner and is extremely funny.
You can see the cast are having a great time and that they are enjoying their work and so if anybody likes Monty Python stuff then this is the show for you. And even if you do not like Monty python this is still a great show in it's own right.
See link below for more information

http://www.montypythonsspamalot.com/

Saturday 30th September- More rain and we do need it

My other sister Madeleine and her husband Ken arrived for the weekend. In the evening we went to the local church hall to see the Weybridge Mail Voice choir together with the Hart Mail Voice Choir for a great evening’s entertainment.

The voices were great and they provided a very different choice of music and then combined for the last few songs. About 250 people attended the evening and they provided wine at the half time break (beats oranges any day)

Friday 29th September- It’s raining again

We left the Hotel after a heart breakfast and headed for Longleat Safari Park

(http://www.longleat.co.uk/). It was a greyish day but looked to improve. We decided only to do the Safari Park bit and ignore the train and boat rides and so we headed of to the jungle.
We took a some pictures during our visit and they are on..
They have done a good job and it is well organised and even the animals follow the instructions not to eat the guests. We decided to stay away from the Monkey area
as these will damage your car and are know to rip out radio aerials, windscreen wipers and even wing mirrors and petrol cap covers. This is worse than the bad places in London.
Anyway the Tiger and Lions were the main attraction for us and we had a very good view, so see the photos on ourPhoto Blog at

http://noelgroves.phanfare.com/

We left the park around midday so as top avoid the Friday night traffic and headed home where we arrived around 2.30 pm.

Thursday 28th September- Its time to leave Salcombe

After the usual good breakfast we headed down town to the over 60’s coffee morning which is held in a purpose built location right by the sea with a great view over the Salcombe Harbour. After tea and biccies we headed of to Darting ton Hall (www.dartingtonhall.com)

This was a beautiful spot where you can stay in the small amount of rooms that are available whilst visiting the gardens. Unfortunately time was running away and we had an excellent lunch at the ‘White Hart’ pub located in the park. We had decided that we would like to visit the Longleat Safari park on the way home and this is located not far from Trowbridge. Our plan was to arrive at a Hotel we had booked at Bradford upon Avon around 4.30 pm however there was a bad accident on the A 303 which delayed us for a while and so we arrived at our destination around 6pm. The hotel was the Woolley Grange Hotel (www.woolleygrangehotel.co.uk) and was a very old hotel set in lovely grounds which we could not see as it was dark! Anyway the rooms were nice and the food was excellent.. Our bedroom was unfortunately above the kitchen and this became apparent later in the evening when they insisted on dropping empty bottles in to their bottle bank up to almost midnight. Needless top say I complained the following morning. Otherwise this was a very nice hotel and we would stay again but in a different room.

We had a lovely time in Salcombe and Annette and Peter made great hosts and Cyril thoroughly enjoyed his holiday.

Wednesday 27th September- Here comes de rain

Well the rain arrived as promised but we had decided to go along the coast to visit Dartmouth which is a very nice town with an attractive harbour and there place was bustling. En-route we stopped for a visit at Torcross which was a small town which was used during the Second World War as a trial landing site for D-day. Unfortunately many American service men lost their lives when during the practise run they were spotted by German submarines and two troop carriers were sunk. There is now a old American Tank to mark the spot. Torcross is also the location of Slapton Ley a wildlife sanctuary which is a fresh water lake which is next to sea and protected only by a road. There were many birds on this lake and also it is a sight for conservation experts to spend there time. For more info visit (www.slnnr.org.uk/)

Then on to Dartmouth we went where we were in urgent need of a cup of tea, and some of us had the Devon Cream Tea, which went down very well indeed.

This is a nice little town with small shopping street and also the Dart Valley Steam train leaves from here. The weather was not great so we decided to head of back to Salcombe. It was rather grey and misty so I decided not to take any photos of the bays en-route home.

All photos on Photo Blog http://noelgroves.phanfare.com/

Tuesday 26th September- What beautiful weather

It was a a really beautiful day and so we headed of to Kingsbridge to take a harbour tour to Salcombe Bay and almost out to sea.. It was a great photo opportunity what with the egrets, oyster catchers and many other birds in great quantities. During the trip we had an excellent view of Salcombe Bay and and also the remains of Salcombe castle which was built by Henry VIII. To protect the harbour from foreign invaders. For more information see link below

www.castleuk.net/castle_lists_south/202/salcombecastle.htmails see

We were able to take may photographs during the boat trip and they are available on

Following a light lunch of smoked salmon we departed to visit the National Trust site called ‘Overbecks’. This was an old house which was used in the first world war as a rest and recuperation site for the many injured personnel. This house has a prominent position on the headland with great views over the estuary. The garden was very nice with many plants just going out of season but this place was well worth the visit. For more information see

www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-vh/w-visits/w-findaplace/w-overbecks/

A very nice day was had by all.

Photo Blog http://noelgroves.phanfare.com/

Monday 25th September Going to Salcombe

Together with Jennifer’s Dad, Cyril we left around 1030 for a pleasant drive to see my sister and husband who live in the Devon village of Salcombe where they have lived for quite some years. Our route took us down the A 303 via Stonehenge which is a group of stones built in the year 3100 BC, for more details see the link below. The journey took on the outside of Exeter and finally via Totnes in to Salcombe. About 200 miles and almost five hours driving.

After a short stay at home and with weather sort of okay we went down town to have a look at Salcombe and have a very necessary drink at the Marine Club.

A few glasses of wine at home and off to bed for all.

http://www.stonehenge.co.uk/about.htm