Pause for breath. Have just arrived home from Blakeney, and Dot is about to leave for Brooke school, where she is sitting in on Ofsted feedback. Earlier we had lunch at Cookie’s, which was preceded by a short walk down to Salthouse beach, in the course of which we stumbled upon a geocache. As you do.
On the coast it’s a bit cooler than it has been but the previous two days were especially warm, and I had to have suncream applied before we went for two longish walks – from Holkham to Wells (Monday) and from Burnham Overy Staithe out to the distant beach (Tuesday). On Monday we had lunch at the rather upmarket Beach Café, then walked round town for a bit before getting the Coasthopper back to Holkham. On Tuesday we drove to Burnham Deepdale for lunch, having had early coffee/tea at The Hero. Excellent Deepdale sandwich, but very sore eyes, presumably because of pollen.
We had arrived at Blakeney quite late on Sunday, after my preaching at church and then watching England beating Panama 6-1. Should have been more, but they lost interest in the second half, and so did we. Hamilton won the French grand prix and England completed a one-day whitewash against Australia, but we missed all that.
Back to the biggest day of a very big week, which was the celebration of our Golden Wedding on Saturday at Angela and Rodney’s house. The weather was perfect – sunny and warm but not too hot, and so were the surroundings. The guests were also delightful: David, Oliver and Amy; Denise and Peter; Anne and Philip (on crutches because of a recent fall on holiday); Fred and Sue; Jessie, Roger and Debbie; Dave and Julia; Alan and Rosemary; Donna and Andy; Phil and Joy; plus Vicki and Chris Ellis off and on.
We had a great time, and I think everyone enjoyed it. Admittedly it was over a month early (our wedding anniversary is July 27), but we will be in Canada then. I gave a short speech, and Fred a much more interesting one, borrowing from Gilbert and Sullivan. Having forgotten to tell everyone not to bring gifts, we also received some nice presents.
Fred was also in fine G&S form the previous day, which was a CNS Reunion event, starting at the Louis Marchesi for a very good lunch and continuing at St Mary at Palace Plain for a fascinating talk by Geoff Tudor, who has been living in Japan for 40 years, followed by Fred’s account of his life, which included a number of G&S extracts with assistance from other old boys and Bev McInnes, who is Sue’s cousin and a colleague of Dot (violin) at Sillars. In this case she sang and played piano, though most of the latter was done by Andrew Barnell. Would like to have heard more G&S: most songs were cut short.
Thursday was big day too, because at 7.45am my old friend David Coomes died. I received the news while walking with Dot and the Evetts from Bakery and towards the Wiveton Fruit Farm and cafe. By the time I had finished talking to a very distraught Kristine, the others (blissfully unaware) had entered the cafe and were about to order lunch.
After lunch we continued to Cley and looked at the house Dot had booked for October, when David and the children will be coming up for part of half term. We now know that they will also be going to Canada next month and will be coming back with us while David stays on. He will also be arriving earlier than them: they will travel on their own, having been delivered to Gatwick by their mother.
After all this, we arrived back in Norwich in time for me to go to a book launch at NRO, where I chatted with the publisher; the director of NRO, who I know reasonably well; and Joseph Mason, who writes a blog about Norfolk and Suffolk which I often read and sometimes comment on. As a boy, he lived near my grandmother at Poringland. His wife Molly is friendly with the wife of one of the photographers at the EDP in times past – Dennis Whitehead.