Oct 2007 a

Mon 01 Oct 2007
Back to work.... and yes the bathroom and any plumbing problems are all sorted out.
Unfortunately, the camera decides to stop working. Jen tries to order some new batteries (over the net, since no-where stocks them) in the hope that's where the problem lays. Also unfortunately there's a postal worker strike on, so this could take some time.....

Thu 04 Oct 2007
Our second round of house guests arrive: Stephen Aldred and Mathilde, and their son BJ.

Fri 05 Oct 2007
The three guests and Steve head into town for a "beer and museum" night at the British Museum. Jen insead picks up Kiriel from London City Airport, 15 minutes down the road from home.

Sat 06 Oct 2007
All 6 of us visited Hampton Court Palace. Good weather for it too! Photos courtesy of Stephen and Mathilde since our camera's not working.

Above: The entrance to Hampton Court Palace
Below: Merry band of explorers!

Below: The Tudor Kitchens and staff....



Below: The famous painting 'field of the cloth of gold' is kept here.


Above: What a view! Someone used to wake up to this (sans the tourists that is)
Then in the evening we had dinner together, all of us, plus Jenny and Nick. Lots of wine was drunk!

Sun 07 Oct 2007
Kiriel catches up with Dan, Elizabeth and Terry. The rest of us do the ancient monument tour in our car: Stonehenge, Avebury, Silbury Hill and West Kennet Long Barrow, Chalk Horse and Uffington Castle. Really really lucky the rain held off all day!
Below: almost there! Yes that's Stonehenge as seen from the highway.


Below: a different bunch of rocks - the town of Avebury is situated inside the stone circle!


Below: We had lunch in the Red Lion in the heart of Avebury (yes, we ate inside an ancient stone circle).


Above: West Kennet Long Barrow is an ancient burial mound which now has a concreted roof so tourists can walk around inside without fear of joining the ancestors!
Below: Silbury hill - ancient, hand made hill. Yes those are really really big, full-sized trees next to it.

For our final stop we saw the Chalk Horse.


Above: Jen couldn't help herself and had to poke the horse in the eye. Eco-vandal!

Mon 08 Oct 2007
Back to work again....

Tue 09 Oct 2007
All the house guests depart.

Thu 11 Oct 2007
Final packing for Crown Tourney weekend.

Fri 12 Oct 2007
After work, we head on up to Norwich to find
'heirs' to the thrones of Drachenwald.

Sat 13 Oct 2007
Fantastic weather! Like a cool Summer's day - perfect for a tournament!
The tourney itself was fairly 'clean' and everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves lots. Sir Cadogan wowed us all by voluntarily giving up two points of advantage in the same bout - astonishing! The feast managed to have everyone in the one room (thankfully!) and court went pretty well.

There was one person who came up as "their first court" to receive a token, but took the chance to ramble on about old times (so obviously not a new-comer). About the point where he mentioned Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Earl Marcus reported that he saw "the Dragon cross her Majesty's face" and Jen firmly told the chap to kindly take the token and re-join the populace. :-)

Ball in the evening was good fun, hall decorations nice, everyone was in really high spirits! Oh, and our Heirs are Duke Sir Sven and his Lady Jovi. By some twist of fate, Sven is the steward in charge of running... his own coronation event! Good luck to him!
Anyway, here are a few photos, courtesy of the spectators - thank you!




The above photos and many others can be seen at: www.betahelix.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=84&page=1

Sun 14 Oct 2007
Packed and left by 10:30am. Arrived home 1pm, unpacked, got the laundry going, showers and relax (slightly exhausted). We both had a 3 hour nap before getting up for dinner. :-)