We had booked a country house for the week at Oakhampton Park. The house accommodated everyone easily and the magnificent gardens, swimming pool, croquet lawn, and many other facilities ensured there was plenty for everyone.

We had an amazing week and the sections below attempt to capture our week together.
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THE HOUSE AND GARDENS

A view of the front of the house:

and a view of the back of the house from below the Croquet Lawn

The gardens were massive and fabulous.
There was a large lawn in the front of the sweeping driveway where we played Smite. Right at the back, surrounded by beautiful borders and yew hedges, there was a very popular croquet lawn. We might not have known the finesse required but none of us showed much mercy to our opponents.


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There were other lawns below the croquet lawn for relaxing and lots else to explore as Archie found.

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INSIDE THE HOUSE

The best way to appreciate the splendour of Oakhampton Park is to look at the website www.oakhamptonpark.co.uk. Suffice to say it was lovely. The children enjoyed exploring, watching TV, watching an iPad cuddled up in bed, presenting a puppet show written and produced by themselves and much else!

Although the formal dining room could have seated all the adults, the only time it was full was for the puppet shows. Some of the children ate there but for the rest of us the large kitchen table and table and chairs on the patio outside the kitchen were where we congregated, ate and played cerebral games (provided by Jon)


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SWIMMING POOL

The 50ft heated
indoor swimming pool proved a tremendous success with the children whose water confidence increased incredibly during the week.

The adults may not have used the fully equipped gym or the sauna but most spent time in the pool.




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MEXICAN EVENING

One
evening we enjoyed a Mexican Theme. Hannah and James produced wonderful food, James made Mojitos, Gerry made Margaritas and Annie provided a donkey piñata filled with sweets. The picture shows Felix having a bash at the donkey! You may just be able to make out the plastic bags held by children in anticipation of the sweets they’d collect. Starting with the youngest and rising in age the donkey was eventually broken open. There were indeed lots of sweets!

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BIRTHDAY PARTY

On the Wednesday we had a tea party to celebrate two birthdays; Felix was two and Callum eleven. Emma had reminded people that it was her birthday soon (15 August) so we enjoyed three birthday cakes!
Anticipation and then enjoyment.

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OUT AND ABOUT

Apart
from one day with some rain, the weather was very good and various family groups got out and about.
On the first day some went to the rocky shore and cliffs at Kilve.

On another day, Putsborough Sands was a real hit with some braving the sea (very cold) and Emma needing a warm up between her parents. They also enjoyed a pub lunch




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From Left to right: Lucy, Elsie behind Emma, Sienna, Bethany, Oliver behind Ruby, Jo and Jenny. The other members of their families were elsewhere in the building!

Some also went to the stone Clapper Bridge at Tarr Steps and to the West Somerset Railway where ice creams were enjoyed.

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There was one other adventure. On the Monday
afternoon 7 of us set off for a four hour sea fishing trip from Watchet Marina. The team, Gerry, Jo, Alexander, Jenny, Callum, Martin and James (Hopkins) had a great time. James caught the first fish, Gerry the most fish and Alexander the largest fish. Jenny took the lovely picture of the rest of the team so I include a picture of her with a dogfish she landed. Sea conditions were good and we had a great time and everyone had at least one fish.

What a brilliant week!

The children arranged for a professional photographer to visit us with the aim of capturing the whole family as well as the individual family groups. Once her photographs are available, we will publish another Blog entry.

It had been a long time since Jo, and her children had been able to come to the UK so it was very special to welcome all our US family to England.

On Easter Monday, thanks to a suggestion by Hannah, the UK based family except for Martin, Louise and Archie, assembled at Savernake Forest in glorious weather.  Fortunately, Annie and Gerry got there early to secure a suitable site as it got very crowded later.  We all had a lovely time with some children playing football others (Hannah) climbing trees and young Emma wanting to follow suit. The other children, Rosie,Ptolemy, Oscar, Felix, and Elsie has a whale of a time making dens and generally exploring.  Callum and Bethany did more grown up things! 
We enjoyed a super spread with Hot Dogs, BBQ’d sausages, salads, cakes, chocolate and an Easter Egg Hunt for the tiddlers.

Thanks to everyone for their contributions and for braving the Bank Holiday traffic – it was certainly a day to remember.

It was a lovely couple of hours and we were so pleased to be part of the celebrations.

After the park, the grandchildren, under Bethany’s excellent supervision, enjoyed a Grannie Annie Treasure Hunt which culminating in them finding a box of treasure that was carefully distributed amongst all the participants.

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Archie may not have been able to join in the Treasure Hunt but he was content to oversee the activities.

It was a lovely weekend.

We were joined for the meal by Jo’s partner Chuck and his ten year old twins, Ruby and Sam. It was a really nice family occasion.

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As a consequence of the awful wild fires in Northern California, the air quality in San Jose was terrible when we arrived and many schools were closed and all outdoor sporting events were cancelled.  Jo still had to work until Thanksgiving eve so we spent our time packing up some of Jo’s stuff ready for a move into a new home with Chuck and his children at the end of the month. We were able to see their new home  -  it is in a lovely area and has very large rooms, large garage and drive as well as a big outdoor kitchen including a fridge!

For Thanksgiving we were invited to join Chuck’s family at the Pajaro Dunes Resort on the coast between Capitola and Monterey where they had rented apartments for a family gathering.  We were immediately made welcome by Chuck’s mum, his sister and brothers, their partners and children and soon felt very much part of their family.  It was very clear that Jo and her children were already well and truly part of Chuck’s extended family. The photo below (just prior to our Thanksgiving meal) is of all the family except for Gerry and the brother taking photographs!

I have taken cut outs from various photographs to show, Jo and Chuck, Alexander, Oliver, Sienna and Ruby and Sam

The smog that had greeted us on our arrival San Jose gradually dissipated over the next few days and was followed by heavy rains, the first for some months. Once the rain stopped Pajaro Dunes looked very beautiful.

On the Saturday morning before we returned to San Jose, Jo took Annie, Gerry and Alexander to Capitola pier and Oliver to the adjacent surfing beach.  Gerry was given a new fishing rod by Jo and the children as a belated birthday present so he and Alexander were able to spend the morning fishing.

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Gerry thoroughly enjoyed the fishing catching 15 fish of various sorts.

The only commonality was that they were quite small.  You can just make out one of the smaller fish in Gerry’s hand.

Alexander, however, may not have caught as many but he certainly had the biggest fish.

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We returned to Pajaro Dunes to say goodbye to Chuck’s family and then returned to San Jose on Saturday afternoon.  Jo, Alexander, Oliver and Sienna also returned and we spent the rest of the day and Sunday morning packing Jo’s kitchen into boxes ready for the move. Chuck, Ruby and Sam came over to say goodbye before we left to fly home that evening.

Jo and Chuck seem so right together and the children also get on amazingly well. We are sure that they will be a very happy family once they have completed the move and settled in to their new home.

With a few days of good weather forecast and an empty diary we headed to Yorkshire and our usual B&B (Pear Tree House) in Pickering. We arrived at lunch time and immediately set out on a walk up the valley beside the Pickering Beck. It was a lovely walk and we were treated to views of several trains including the one below,

The next morning we set off for
Whitby visiting Grosmont station on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway (NYMR) en route.  Annie was looking in the station shop (Gerry was looking at engines) and found a book detailing a walk from Goathland Station to Grosmont via the track bed of the old 1834 railway line.  The book was packed with fascinating information so we decided that we should do the walk the next day.  However, on that morning we continued our drive to Whitby.

We had a stroll around Whitby which was surprisingly busy before visiting The Magpie for a wonderful lunch. After lunch we headed across the Moors to Farndale for one of our favourite walks beside the River Dove returning along a road which gave us superb views over the Dale. It was a great way to end our day.

The next morning, in brilliant weather we drove to Grosmont Station and caught the steam train to Goathland. We then followed instructions in our new book to meander the three and a half miles back to Grosmont. We thoroughly enjoyed the walk noting many bits of industrial archaeology that we wouldn’t have without the book. The walk is very gentle following the old track bed until we approached Grosmont.  Here we deviated from the track bed as it joined the current railway line and we were not allowed to walk through the tunnel.  Instead, we had to climb up and then down a fairly steep hill.  However, the view of the station and the surrounding tress and town from the top of the hill made the effort worthwhile.

After coffee
and a snack in the car we drove to Tbornton Le Dale a small town a couple of miles east of Pickering. We then set out on one of our favourite “strolls” along riverside field paths to the hamlet of Ellerburn with its ancient church and the Tea Cosy tea rooms.  We enjoyed a cup of tea and some cakes before heading back to Thornton le Dale.

On our way back we passed this lovely cottage beside the beck.

We returned to Pickering feeling that our walks had earned us an evening visit to Spice 4 U, a really good curry house that we have visited at least once if not twice on every one of our stays in Pickering.

The next day, we headed home via Thorner and lunch with Bridget and David Lindley at their local Italian Restaurant.  The journey back to Gloucestershire was very busy with the Sat Nav adding many minutes for delays  (volume of traffic and rush hour).  Gerry doesn’t like traffic jams and so we decided to drive down the Fosse Way.  It may have taken as long as the main roads with their delays but we met no traffic and Gerry was able to enjoy the drive.

The
week was rounded off with an overnight visit from Lucy, James and Emma.

Emma enjoyed splashing in the puddles left by the heavy rain that fell after our return from Yorkshire!

Then on Monday, we spent the day in Bristol looking after Oscar and Felix whilst Jon and Jess went to a couple of Primary School Open Days – It’s hard to believe, but Oscar will start primary school next year.