We fly out of New York at 6.30pm on Tuesday. That’s 11.30pm UK time.  We are with British Airways and much as it goes against my grain to praise Alan Joyce, I’m afraid BA just doesn’t measure up to Qantas.  We are served dinner but the cabin lights don’t go out until about 2am.  Suffice to say, not much sleep.  In fact none, even though we chose the no breakfast option.  We land at 6.30am and are at our hotel near Victoria Station by 8.45am, both feeling a bit crossed eyed.  Mercifully the room was available so we shower and change and then hot foot it, via the tube, to Waterloo East Station where we take the train to Sevenoaks to visit one of my mother’s oldest surviving (perhaps the only surviving now) friend who has recently moved  into a home for the older folk. Dear Brenda Austen, of whom I am terribly fond, is still sharp as a tack mentally, and only a little frail physically.  She will turn 93 next month.  Her son Christopher meets us at the station at 11.10am and drives us to the Sunrise home (kind of them not to name it Sunset) where Brenda awaits, looking resplendent in her sky blue cashmere twin set and pearls. We have coffee and then go out to the Kings Head pub for lunch.  This is Brenda’s first meal out since she moved seven months ago.  She has been in hospital twice in that time and so today was a special treat for both she and me.

 

She is a darling person with a wicked sense of humour whom I adore and I am thrilled to see her, possibly for the last time.

At 2.30pm, by arrangement, our dear friend David Williams rocks up at the pub with his beautiful dog Roxy and half an hour later we wave Brenda and Christopher off,  not without a very big hug for Brenda.  David has driven all the way from Tenby in the south west of Wales to see us.  He stayed overnight with his oldest friend, Neville, en route and Neville accompanied him to Sevenoaks.   He seems a better conversationalist than Roxy.

We have a lovely 2 hours with David, Roxy and Neville in the pub garden on a glorious sunny day, the warmest we have had since leaving home. David has had a torrid three years, with the death of his father and the demise of his mother and he describes Roxy as his saviour.  He and his sister have recently moved their mother into a nursing home in her home town of Swansea which has freed him up to regain his own life.  Another real treat today to see David.  He and Neville, under the supervision of Roxy, drop us at the train station at 4.30pm for our return trip to London.  No rain, but a fairly typical English sky!

We get back to the hotel by 5.30pm and head off half an hour later for a light dinner,which is all we can afford in London.  I even forego the glass of wine when I read the price – ₤11 for a glass of wine!  An early, and sober, night.

Thursday sees Cherrie feeling unwell again.  She has battled a cold and cough for three weeks now, had a few (previously unreported) sick days in New York and now feels it’s time to see a doctor for fear of a chest infection.  We finally find a medical practice in Victoria Station which will see her as a private patient at 2.30pm and really do not much before that, save for a snack in the local greasy spoon.  We were paying customers!

 The doctor is a very nice woman who says that Cherrie’s chest sounds clear but has given her antibiotics to start should she feel worse in the next day or so.  Easier than trying to communicate with a French doctor, since we are uncivilised and uneducated non bilingualists.  At 3pm we set out to the Royal Academy to see the ‘Painting the Modern Garden:  Monet to Matisse’ exhibition.  This is really the only thing we really wanted to do in London in this, our only day here.  But we arrive to find there are no tickets available for the remainder of the exhibition – another two weeks to go!  So we cruise the Burlington Arcade instead and I buy a pair of gold stud earrings!  I am served by a charming young gentleman (‘young’ is anyone who has not yet travelled beyond 50 yrs) who goes by the name of Matthew Wildsmith.  When I ask the origin of his name, and the manner of the smithing, he advises me that his family go back to the 13^th century as shoe smiths, and that indeed his grandfather made the first ever slip on shoe, for King George VI.  I am impressed.  St Dunstan, of course, was the first Archbishop of Canterbury so we go back further (he died in 988 but I don’t remember him).  To the best of my knowledge he dealt in other souls, although may well have been a heel.

Another early (and no doubt abstaining) dinner tonight and early departure tomorrow to catch the 8am train to Paris with connection to Chateauroux for the start of our French trip.

More soon. Au Revoir