A day out in Newbury

You have to give it to the poms. They may whinge elsewhere but they don't whine about the weather here. They just put on more clothes and go out and do things. Good on 'em, I say. Alan and I thought we would take a leaf out of their book and we went out for the day to Newbury.

I was actually a very pretty town. The canals were lovely and so was the market atmosphere of the place. Alan bought me a new hat for my birthday and some gloves, and a scarf. We had lunch in a nice old pub that looked out over the canals and watched the swans and two intrepid paddlers in kyaks go by. Then we went for a wander along the canals. The whole day the temperature didn't get above freezing and all the trees and bushes were covered in frost.

Eventually, like all good Aussie tourists, we proceeded to hang out in shop doorways trying to cadge a bit of warmth from the heaters and pretending to be interested in buying something. Eventually completely outdone by the locals, who were still out and about we looked at each other and said something along the lines of it's fxxxking freezing, lets go home - to Australia we meant - but ended up back in Basingstoke.

Back to Basingstoke

We had a lovely Christmas and New Year in balmy Ireland. Yes it was around 12c there and contrary to popular belief, it didn't rain much at all. We even had glimpse of a blue sky. This whole picture was almost tropical compared to what was waiting when we got back to Basingstoke. The house had been empty for a fortnight and any ambient temperature in it had long gone. The temperature in England dropped to its lowest in years, with days consistently below freezing. Not that I'm a weather, whinging Aussie but this is us on our first night back in the house.

Malahide Castle, Dublin

Dublin is truly a fair city. I loved the bridges and the river views. We stayed in a B&B there that looked out across a bay and the host suggested that we take the day to have a look at Malahide Castle. It was very interesting as the castle had been in the Talbot family since 1185 and the final living member of the family only sold it to the local council in the 1973 and moved to the family estate in Tasmania, yes Tassie.


Lord Milo Talbot was renowned for collecting plants from the Southern Hemisphere and he created a walled botanical garden. He apparently wrote an introduction to a book called The Endemic Flora of Tasmania. Many of the plants in and around the Castle are Australian natives; eucalyptus, wattle; gravillia etc. Note the gum tree at the front of the Castle in this picture. I have to say when I crushed the leaves in my fingers I was transported immediately to Strawbella and felt quite homesick.


The furniture in the place was old and interesting and much of it had been in the family for centuries. The local Fingal Council, who now own the place are collecting examples of Irish furniture of the period. The families influence on history was also interesting. It was said that 14 members of the family had breakfast together in the dining room before going off to fight the famous Battle of the Boyne, where they were all killed. Oliver Cromwell gave the Castle to one of his supporters, Miles Corbet, who was later hung, drawn and quartered when the Castle was returned to the Talbots in 1660 after Cromwell passed over.

There was also a brilliant collection of minature furniture from Irish cabinet makers. Apparently when apprenticed cabinet makers were in the final year they made a number of minature pieces to show thier customers what they could do. The customers would then be able to order the full size piece with confidence that the craftsman could do a good job. The minatures were absolute masterpieces in their own right.

The Giant's Causeway

After we headed off from Castlerock, we went to Belfast and took a day's tour to look at the amazing heritage listed Giant's Causeway. The rock formations were incredible and the coastline continued to be beautiful. It was an icy cold day but not rainy and when the sunlight highlighted the cliffs and grassy banks it was easy to see why Ireland is the Emerald Isle. The green is luminus and like I've never seen before.

While we were in Belfast we visited our other in laws, Gordon's parents Cecil and Isobel, who made us very welcome. We had a day out in Lisburn visiting the Linen museum where I bought a hand made damask linen runner (should have splurged and got the table cloth too but was too tight). We also me one of the weavers there, Alison who is one of only 3 weavers left in the country who know how to make the damask linen. She told us that it takes 7 years to learn how to thread the loom and weave the linen. The looms were 160 years old and had come from local weavers cottages. The museum showed the whole process of makng the linen fibre and it also had a lot of interesting local history information. I was impressed.

We left Lisburn and headed for Enniskillen. We drove through Armagh and Sligo to get there. Unfortunately we kept underestimating the daylight hours. It didnt get to be daylight until around 8.30 and was dark at 4.00. Of course we didn't get going until about 11am and were just getting into it and it was dark. Consequently we didn't see as many things as we could have had we been better tourists. We spent the night in Enniskillen and had a look at the Castle and Barrack grounds but it was shut because tourist dont go there at Christmas, or apparently much in winter. We wandered up the mainstreet and looked at the churches, the Catholic church was open and we went in. It was a beautiful church and had a statue of my patron saint (St Therese, the little flower). I think I chose her as my confirmation saint because I like it that she carried a bunch of roses. I really had no idea at the time that she held an significance from a spiritual point of view. It was only years later that I discovered she is also the patron saint of children, which was interesting given my years in child and family services.