Two On Tour

Saturday 14 December

We wake up in Split to hideous weather: sheets of cold rain of tropical intensity, completely obliterating our last views of the city. Miraculously, it clears just before we have to leave. By the time we reach the nearby taxi rank, the sun has come out. Our taxi driver turns out to speak excellent English and we launch into the best conversation I’ve had with a Croatian since arriving 23 days ago. We cover corrupt local politics, his time spent press-ganged into the Croatian army, and how Croats and Serbs get along just fine when they’re abroad. He’s an absolute pleasure to talk to.

Split airport is new and, at this time of year, almost empty. Within 15 minutes of walking in, we’re at our gate. We land at a wet, grim Zurich airport to transfer to Heathrow, where we’re in the arrivals hall 15 minutes after disembarking. It’s all been very efficient, but now we have a three-hour wait for the National Express service to Fareham—plenty of time to sift the final batch of photos from Split and post a Facebook update on our World Tour.

The coach departure time comes and goes without any sign of a coach. But just as I’m getting grouchy and starting to complain about how hopeless England is, it finally swings in. The driver has a bit of foot-to-the-floor fixation, which rattles me every time I open my eyes to see everything outside passing in a blur, but we arrive safely in Fareham. Mum’s bungalow is chilly but just about bearable.

Sunday 15 December

Welcome to dark mornings! There’s not much point heading out for my morning constitutional down to Portchester Castle and back until it’s light enough to see, so I hold off until 7.45. It’s a grey morning, with a damp mist clinging to the shoreline. It’s beautiful in its own austere way, but at the same time I’m glad that I don’t have three months of this ahead of me.

After a Sunday roast of juicy gammon, we head out to Whiteley (I’d never heard of it), so that I can stock up on some clothing basics for the coming year. We also pick up a guidebook to Poland, which we’ll leave with mum for now.

Back at mum’s we start working on a festive jigsaw. After a supper of crumpets, we settle down to watch Holiday Inn with Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire.

Monday 16 December

I have a eye test appointment to keep so we head into Fareham. I’d always been impressed with the eye care offered in Hong Kong, but – bearing in mind that you get what you pay for – the GBP30 eye test at SpecSavers is on another level to what I’m used to. I walk out with a new prescription and with two new pairs of glasses on order. After a pub lunch with readily-available zero-alcohol beer, we head back to mum’s, where we all muck in with the Christmas jigsaw.

Tuesday 17 December

We’re adopted by mum’s U3A walking group as we trudge around the environs of Stansted House near Rowland’s Castle, just over the border in West Sussex. There’s an austere beauty to the fields and woods on a damp, grey winter’s day. I’ve met a couple of the group before at other U3A socials. Everyone is very accommodating and keen to chat.

Wednesday 18 December

A quiet day today. We pop over to Fareham to get an International Driving Permit, and continue working on the Christmas jigsaw.

Thursday 19 December

Mum drives us to Hinton Ampner, a National Trust property near Alresford, which has a small but beautifully crafted Christmas makeover. Back in Portchester, it’s back to the jigsaw, and then to the The Wicor Mill Christmas pub quiz.

Friday 20 December

I spend the morning up a ladder scooping handfuls of gunk out of mum’s guttering. It’s mucky work, but it’s good to be doing something outdoorsy and domestic. After lunch, it’s back to the jigsaw, which is coming together nicely…

Saturday 21 December

A morning chat with Shirley and Barney…

…and the jigsaw is finished!

Sunday 22 December

A bus ride into Portsmouth to watch mum perform with her RockChoir, and a Christmas variety show in the evening over at Titchfield.

Monday 23 December

A very quiet day, mostly spent working…

Tuesday 24 December

..and a very quiet Christmas Eve. Rental car booked for our first week in New Zealand. Christmas Eve itself, we have a video chat with Sue and Claire in New Zealand, and Mark in Australia. And we watch Joyeux Noel. I haven’t seen it for years. K and mum watch it for the first time. I’d completely forgotten that despite its French title, it’s more or less equal parts in French, English and German. Still a great film for making you feel part of something bigger at this time of year.

Wednesday 25 December

The day that Richard Spurr came to Christmas dinner! He’s as hard work as ever, but he’s been in poor health recently and we didn’t want him to be on his own for Christmas. It’s lovely to see him, even if no one else gets a word in for the 11 hours that he holds court with a non-stop barrage of words. He’s thoroughly generous, arriving with white wine, red wine, dessert wine and champagne. But by the time he clambours into his Tesla shortly before midnight, the remaining three of us are exhausted.

Thursday 26 December/Friday 27 December

Quiet post-Christmas Days with mum. On Friday, we head off to see my first pantomime in 40+ years: Hansel and Gretal. It’s all good festive fun. The Sugar Plum Fairy is a stand in and delivers her lines with a big pink book containing the script in her hands. She’s fantastic. I also discover an old Roses tin filled with old 80s and 90s paraphanalia, from old gig tickets to old correspondence: a postcard from Sarah Walker in France, a letter from Sheena Deadman shortly after she moved to Farnborough, my Land’s End–John O-Groats diary, and a whole jumble of student ID cards from my days in Glasgow and Manchester. A poignant diamond mine of memories.

Saturday 28 December

Ian and Rose arrive for an overnight stay at mum’s. Plenty of fun and games: Pencil and paper, Boogle, and a Stackwaddy I’ve been keeping for the occasion: Hip festive vegan recipe or challenging 80s indie band? Sample: Candid Yams. Dinner at a Thai restaurant at Port Solent.

Sunday 29 December

We say goodbye to mum and head off for lunch with Anna (she insisted on no photo of her, but she’s looking fabulous for 75), and then on to a pub dinner with James and Rachel (we forgot to take a photo), who we’re staying with for the next couple of nights.

Monday 30 December

We’re staying with James and Rachel for a couple of nights. In between walking Flora twice, we have lunch with Pauline and Ben Cowling. On returning to James and Rachel’s place, we discover that Rachel used to be Ben’s sister’s lodger.

Tuesday 31 December

A sardine-tin rail ride as far as Birmingham, followed by a more comfortable ride on to Nottingham. Kev is still recovering from a bug, so we see in 2025 in a Premier Inn near Nottingham Trent University after a stroll around the city centre on a dark and gloomy New Year’s Eve.

Wednesday 1 January

A fantastic start to the new year with old friends. James and Clara arrive from Hereford in time for lunch at Kev and Threycia’s. K, Kev, James and I hop in an Uber to Meadow Lane, where we meet up with John to watch Notts Country throw away a slender lead to eventually lose 1-2 to top-of-the-table Walsall. The crowd for this League Two match is almost 13,000 – more than Premier League Bournemonth typically draw. The crowd makes for a good atmosphere, as does the gathering dusk over the industrial skyline beyond the stadium.

We leave the stadium in a fine drizzle and stroll to the Bell Inn in the city centre, where Clara and Threycia join us.

Thursday 2 January

James and Clara pop back round to Kev and Threycia’s for lunch. Afterwards, we stroll around Gedling in glorious winter sunshine. James and Clara head back to Hereford; we take a bus into Nottingham to have dinner and a drink with Joey, who’s on fine form.

Friday 3 January

We say goodbye to Kev and Threycia and hop in a taxi over to the Smiths in Wollaton on other side of Nottingham. A planned stroll in Wollaton Park is scuppered by news reports of an ‘incident’ in the park, which will turn out to be a body discovered in the lake at lunchtime. (The circumstances turn out to be non-suspicious, but at the time of writing it’s unclear how it happened.) With John and Judy, we instead head for a nearby ridge and trudge around for a good half an hour before returning to Wollaton for coffee and cake.

Back at Ashchurch Drive, we happily while away the evening with one eye on a ’60 years of music on BBC2′ retrospective, while happily shooting the breeze until late.

Saturday 4 January

Kathryn heads off with another former Tiny colleague, Momoko and her family, for yum cha in Sheffield. John’s sister Julie, brother-in-law Bob, and mum Jean pop over to Ashchurch Drive to collect Emily and Natalie and whisk them off for a few hours. Wollaton Park is open to the public again, so John and I head out for an amble around the lake and then on past Wollaton Hall and down to the bus stop, where we catch a bus into the city centre to meet up with Kev for lunch. It’s oddly comforting strolling the centre of Nottingham with John and Kev. After lunch, we rummage in Fopp for a while before trudging on through the bitter cold to Hopkinson’s, a sort of Nottingham version of Affleck’s Palace. We spend another hour further rummaging through old books, records and clothes. John eventually emerges with a vinyl copy of the Tremelos’ greatest hits. I, naturally, emerge empty-handed: I’m already a little concerned about the weight of our luggage now that we’re carrying clothes for both the north European winter and tropical Thailand.

Back at Ashchurch Drive, a full roast dinner of chicken and pork is sizzling in the oven. Snow is due, but by the time we’ve watched Match of the Day and retire to bed shortly before midnight, there’s little more than a light dusting on the road outside.

Sunday 5 January

We wake to find not a lot more snow than had fallen eight hours earlier when we went to bed. Emily and Natalie are a little disappointed, but it suits us just fine: we have a train to catch to Birmingham at midday and snow isn’t part of our bucket list for today. We leave the Smiths late morning in an Uber bound for Nottingham railway station. It’s bitterly cold, damp, grey and desolate outside. But the train leaves on time (against all odds?) and we arrive at our Airbnb in Birmingham city centre shortly before 2pm. It’s been wonderful to see old friends, but it’s equally wonderful to have our own space again.

The Airbnb is warm, cosy, and comfortable enough for our needs these next four days. We’re in Chinatown and its oddly comforting to see the street names written in traditional Chinese characters under the English names. It’s good to have some space to ourselves again beyond a single night in a hotel room on New Year’s Eve. After settling in and getting groceries from a Tesco Express right across the road, we head out to meet another of K’s former Tiny colleagues, Andrew, at the cavernous and excellently named The Head Full of Steam, the other side of New Street Station.

Monday 6 January

K slips out for lunch with another former Tiny colleague (they’re everywhere!) while I stay in the flat catching up on life admin. We spend the evening with Moll and Iain, with daughters Kate and Elliot, and Kate’s partner Harry, in leafy King’s Heath. It’s wonderful to see Moll after 20 years (and Ian and Kate after 23 years). We immediately carry on as if we saw each other yesterday. Moll looks inexplicably youthful for a woman about to turn 60. I’d forgotten just how much younger – nine years – Iain is than Moll: he was 26 the last time I saw him in Hong Kong on their own World Tour – with a three-year-old in tow – in far off 2001. I get to know Kate and Elliot over dinner before we all retire to the living room to chat and play Jackbox TV games. Moll’s second career as a podiatrist is going well, while Iain has put the teaching to one side to write his crime and fantasy novels full-time. Kate, now 26, and Harry have bought their own place out at Worcester, and Elliot, 20, will be heading to film school in Falmouth later this year. A fabulous evening of the sort that by its very nature can only happen a handful of times in a lifetime.

Tuesday 7 January

The weather is cold and wet, and hardly conducive to exploring Birmingham at any length. We spend the evening in an Indian restaurant with K’s former Tiny colleagues Cindy, who’s come over from Tamworth, and Andrew, who we also saw in Sunday.

Wednesday 8 January

Today is the one day that we spend exploring Birmingham just a little. The Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery is curiously scattershot and underwhelming to the extent that its grand old coffee shop is arguably its most diverting feature.

In the evening, we head down to Moseley to have dinner with Toni, Kel and daughter Emma. It’s been more than five years and it’s fantastic to see them again.

Thursday 9 January

It’s goodbye to Birmingham. Winter sunshine streams through the window of our National Express service to Victoria, and we’re soon both pleasantly dozing with our headphones on.

We arrive at Ian and Rose’s as it’s getting dark. Our timing is poor – Ian’s just received some more bad news on a job he applied for and is quite upset. We excuse ourselves by heading out for groceries. By the time we get back, he’s perked up a bit. But he’s clearly struggling with job hunting. We while away the evening watching three great TV shows that are new to me: We are Lady Parts, The Misadventures of Romesh Ranganathan, and Would I Lie to You?

Friday 10 January

Unexpectedly, I’m stuck with a fairly large editing job for KTEO while I’m here with Ian and Rose. That rules out going anywhere in the daytime despite the bright (but chilly) weather. We do venture out in the evening to a Turkish restaurant in Camden, and then on to a heavy metal store that doubles up as a bar serving only zero-alcohol drinks. K and I try a bourbon and a whiskey, both of which are genuinely delicious. I could get used to an alcohol-free way of life were I living here. But I’m not, and Turkey and Thailand beckon, where zero-alcohol drinks are barely heard of.

Saturday 11 January

It’s a freezing but bright and crisp winter day in London. With Ian and Rose, we head north to Southgate with its handsome art deco tube station to walk Winter in Grovelands Park, and tuck into a hearty full English at the nearby Winchmore Pub. On the way back, we get off the Tube at Holloway Road and walk past The Marlborough Building, where dad once worked – now empty but most recently home to the City and Islington College. Rather poignant imaging dad in his early 20s walking to work on Holloway Road, maybe crossing the road occasionally for a pint on pay day.

We were out last night (and we’re middle-aged), so we spend the evening flitting about from show to show on TV: We are Lady Parts, The Misadventures of Romesh Ranganathan, and Would I Lie to You? The latter includes one of the funniest moments I’ve ever experienced: genuinely painful.

Sunday 12 January

We while away the best part of the day chilling at home with Ian and Rose before heading to Staines to see Lucy and Nigel. An excellent evening of catching up, and Lucy’s vegan cooking. Lucy’s still visibly upset about losing her mum last May, and asks not to discuss it. Fair enough.

In the morning, we’ll be off to Istanbul for my hair transplant.