06 September 2005
Fay from Faraway - a visiting mother!!
A few days after we arrived home from Paris Chris' mum Fay arrived from Perth for a two week visit. The flight was a long one and after the bus ride down from London I was amazed to find that she was not sound asleep when I got home from work. In fact Fay didn't seem to suffer from jet lag at all!
She settled straight back into the role of mother and cooked a roast chicken on one of her first nights here - much to our delight. It has been a long time since we had eaten a Fay Mooring roast and despite being on the oppostie side of the world it tasted just like it does at home.
Fay enjoyed looking in the shops in the high street and walking around the city and we were very excited about showing her our new home. While she was here we visited the quay where Fay was surprised at the size of the local swans - until she discovered that the beastie she had spied at was actually a swan-shaped paddle boat being paddled up the river towards us. Oops.
During the evening we watched a few videos and had dinner at a really quaint pub near the cathedral called the Ship Inn. There are ceiling beams in here that Chris has to duck to get under.
On the middle weekend of her visit we did a couple of day trips out of Exeter. On the Saturday we went for a drive to North Devon, via the school I will be working at in the new school year, to a place called Barnstaple. As it turned out, the book that Fay had been reading on the way over was set in a number of the towns nearby. In fact the bad guys in the book were planning to rob all the banks in Barnstaple, so we cased the joint a little while we were there too.
On the Sunday we went a little further afield and took Fay up to Bath in Somerset. It was a pretty day and the drive was lovely - although some of the roads we found ourselves on were smaller than the map might have suggested. We all went in to explore the roman baths and enjoyed the audio tour. There were a lot of American tourists around this time, a lot of tourists in general. Including a small group of nuns in habit who were enjoying the view of the Abbey.
During the week we visited the Walkabout for a cold Australian beer and a chat. We also had lots more home cooked Fay style dinners. The neighbours must have thought we'de hired a maid - she insisted on cooking and doing the laundry and generally looking after us.
The Friday before the weekend she left Chris and I took the day off work. We took Fay to our favorite seaside village of Beer and had a lovely lunch in a sunny beer-garden. We also visited Branscombe - a new place for all of us, where the three of us shared a Devonshire tea. Of course, here in the shire of Devon they arn't called Devonshire teas, they are called cream teas. Yum.
We saw Fay off at the train station on the Saturday afternoon for her flight from Heathrow on Sunday morning. Unfortunately this time she didn't get to see London but with the current climate of fear there I don't think she was too worried about it. It is amazing how quickly two weeks can go by and it already seems like the visit was ages ago. Maybe she can come back next year sometime and visit us where ever we are then.
She settled straight back into the role of mother and cooked a roast chicken on one of her first nights here - much to our delight. It has been a long time since we had eaten a Fay Mooring roast and despite being on the oppostie side of the world it tasted just like it does at home.
Fay enjoyed looking in the shops in the high street and walking around the city and we were very excited about showing her our new home. While she was here we visited the quay where Fay was surprised at the size of the local swans - until she discovered that the beastie she had spied at was actually a swan-shaped paddle boat being paddled up the river towards us. Oops.During the evening we watched a few videos and had dinner at a really quaint pub near the cathedral called the Ship Inn. There are ceiling beams in here that Chris has to duck to get under.
On the middle weekend of her visit we did a couple of day trips out of Exeter. On the Saturday we went for a drive to North Devon, via the school I will be working at in the new school year, to a place called Barnstaple. As it turned out, the book that Fay had been reading on the way over was set in a number of the towns nearby. In fact the bad guys in the book were planning to rob all the banks in Barnstaple, so we cased the joint a little while we were there too.
On the Sunday we went a little further afield and took Fay up to Bath in Somerset. It was a pretty day and the drive was lovely - although some of the roads we found ourselves on were smaller than the map might have suggested. We all went in to explore the roman baths and enjoyed the audio tour. There were a lot of American tourists around this time, a lot of tourists in general. Including a small group of nuns in habit who were enjoying the view of the Abbey.
During the week we visited the Walkabout for a cold Australian beer and a chat. We also had lots more home cooked Fay style dinners. The neighbours must have thought we'de hired a maid - she insisted on cooking and doing the laundry and generally looking after us.
The Friday before the weekend she left Chris and I took the day off work. We took Fay to our favorite seaside village of Beer and had a lovely lunch in a sunny beer-garden. We also visited Branscombe - a new place for all of us, where the three of us shared a Devonshire tea. Of course, here in the shire of Devon they arn't called Devonshire teas, they are called cream teas. Yum.
We saw Fay off at the train station on the Saturday afternoon for her flight from Heathrow on Sunday morning. Unfortunately this time she didn't get to see London but with the current climate of fear there I don't think she was too worried about it. It is amazing how quickly two weeks can go by and it already seems like the visit was ages ago. Maybe she can come back next year sometime and visit us where ever we are then.
# posted by Elke & Chris @ 9:29 pm 
