Two On Tour

Oxford, Nottingham, Macclesfield, Buxton, Reading, Basingstoke and…checks notes…Crawley.

Saturday 23 August

Our taxi driver to St Leonards Warrior Square station is a white Londoner by birth. He also turns out to be the brother-in-law of Beijing’s chief of police, courtesy of his Chinese wife. Or so he says. He’s certainly entertaining.

We briefly emerge in London to make the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it walk from Charing Cross railway station to Embankment tube station. Soon, we’re munching on Pret-a-Manger sandwiches at Victoria, waiting for a coach. As our departure time creeps nearer, our bus to Oxford still doesn’t show on the departures board. At the information desk, I ask why and discover that the National Express service to Oxford is neither a National Express service, nor leaves from Victoria coach station. Instead, a double decker bus sporting the punchy name the Oxford Tube leaves from across the road outside Victoria railway station. How anyone is supposed to know this, I have no idea. We clamber aboard and arrive in Oxford a couple of hours later.

Our Airbnb is rather rudimentary, but it will suffice for four nights. We unpack and stroll into the centre of town. Oxford is more pleasant than I recall it in the 90s thanks to pedestrianisation and bus-only sections of road. It’s already late Saturday afternoon and the daytrippers have already left. There’s space to breathe. We stroll around long enough to get our bearings before heading back to the east side of town, where Cowley Road leaves us spoiled for choice for an evening meal. We pick a Chinese restaurant serving northern Chinese and Szechuan dishes.

Our Airbnb doesn’t have a TV, so we balance an iPad on a chair and settle down to catch up with YouTube posts we’ve missed while staying two-and-a-half weeks with family.

Stoke win at Southampton today, making this Stoke’s equal best start to a season since 1998-99. Could this finally be the season when we’re not utter rubbish?

Sunday 24 August

It’s our first day without company since leaving Gdansk nearly three weeks ago. It’s always good to catch up with family. But it’s also good to get back on routine, chipping away at admin in the morning, reading the news over lunch, and slipping into tourist mode in the afternoon.

It’s a perfect afternoon for a stroll. At mum’s last week, I opened my thirty-year-old Rough Guide to England (still in the dining area bookcase!) and read up on Oxford. Addison’s Walk, a picturesque footpath around a small island in the River Cherwell in the grounds of Magdelen College, caught my eye—and it’s only a few minutes’ from our Airbnb. There’s a charge to access the college, but it’s worth it many times over. To reach Addison’s Walk, we pass through the college cloister, marvel at the trim lawns and gardens of hydrangeas, and soak in the rarified atmosphere on one of Oxford University’s wealthiest colleges:

Addison’s Walk begins the far side of a small stone bridge over the River Cherwell. The circular walk was a favourite of C.S. Lewis, a Fellow of Magdalen College, and circles a water meadow where, from a distance, we see a herd of deer resting under a plane tree. A few others are walking the path on this sun dappled afternoon, but we mostly have it to ourselves.

Like most of life, it’s an ephemeral moment. Half an hour later we’re in Sainsbury’s picking up a few groceries that we overlooked yesterday, before returning to the flat.

Monday 25 August

Todaywe do what we came to Oxford to do: visit the Stanley Donwood/Thom Yorke exhibition of Radiohead and related cover art at the Ashmolean. It turns out to be considerably more engaging than I’d anticipated. There are discarded alternative designs that never saw the light of day, huge original paintings that were only later used or amalgamated into album covers, and the inevitable notebooks containing the first stirrings of the lyrics to songs that would go on to become classics. We did well to pivot and come to Oxford.

After the exhibition, there’s just enough time for coffee and cake on the rooftop terrace of the Asmolean before it closes for the day.

Tuesday 26 August

We spend the afternoon of our final day in Oxford back at the Ashmolean expoloring its art collection. I could happily spend a full day exploring the museum properly, but with less than two hours until closing time when we arrive, we instead head straight for the galleries housing European art after 1800.

The staff at the Ashmolean politely usher us out at five o’clock. It’s too early to eat, so we set off in the direction of the Thames, hoping to squeeze in a late afternoon river walk. We stumble across Christchurch Meadow Walk almost by accident. (I knew it was there, but assumed that as part of Christchurch College it would also be closing soon.) We dreamily loop the meadow, initially wandering the bank of the Thames—so much more handsome here than it is in London—before following the River Cherwell around the east of Christchurch Meadow, with timeless views of the spires of the namesake college. A few other couples are doing the same, but they’re far and few between and we often have this beautiful space more or less to ourselves.

K wants to take a photo in High Street in the exact spot where Turner painted the street over 200 years ago. It’s a bit challenging with buses ploughing by on both sides of the narrow central reservation. The sun is also in just about the least appropriate spot in the sky. But she manages.

From the High Street, we wander back to east Oxford, to the Chinese restautant on Cowley Road that we visited on Saturday. Today, the food is even better: boneless chicken breast in spicy Szechuan sauce, tender fish soup with picked vegetables, and fried green beans with minced pork. It’s simply the best Chinese meal I’ve ever had in England.

Wednesday 27 August

We arrive in Nottingham by coach via Milton Keynes. The first rain in weeks slows our progress, but could hardly be more fortunate in its timing as we sit quietly reading, snug in our seats.

Kev’s at Broad Marsh coach station to collect us and whisk us back to Gedling. The sun has reclaimed the afternoon, and we sit in a shady corner of the garden rambling about anything and everything. Threycia, naturally, has laid on a banquet. It may not sound as if chilli con carne, stewed vegetables, and a sweetcorn-based salad would work together, but of course they do. It’s delicious. After a relatively early dinner, Kev, K and I head to Kev’s local, The Willowbrook, for a couple of pints of good beer and more rambling.

As we’re leaving the pub, a live football match on Sky Sports catches our eye: in a rain-lashed Blundell Park, Man United are 2-0 down to lowly Grimsby in the second round of the League Cup. They’re only playing in Round 2 because they didn’t qualify for any European competition this season, so this is schadenfreude at its most sublime.

Back at Kev’s, we immediately turn on the TV, only to see Man United claw two goals back in the final fifteen minutes. As the match turns to penalties, there’s a grim inevitability that United will progress. And yet, as we hold our collective breath for an unimaginable eighteen minutes—and watch both goalkeepers take successful penalties against each other—Grimsby finally prevail 12-11 when Bryan Mbeumo, recently joined from Brentford, clips the bar with United’s thirteenth penalty kick of the shootout. The ball bounces down, strikes the ground clearly outside the goal, and heads back to Mbeumo, who kicks it away in disgust.

Hundreds of Grimsby fans swarm onto the pitch. The evening belongs to the underdog. Pure joy.

Thursday 28 August

Work keeps trickling in this week. At least it gives Kev and Threycia a rest from K and I as I spend the morning tapping away in the upstairs room, while K nestles quietly.

Finally, the notorious British summer has caught up with us. After lunch, Kev, K and I head out for a ramble, but are forced to cut it short and take a short cut back to Friday Lane when rain starts lashing down.

Later, after a second, more successful, jaunt around Gedling, Joey comes by to drive K to her place in nearby Bingham for a Cantonese hotpot. Kev, Threycia and I sit discussing the pros, cons, ins, and outs of cruises for a long time before Kev and I retreat upstairs to listen to music. This quickly becomes a Radcliffe/Maconie-style chain as we trade songs—some familiar to the other, some not—all evening until K finally forces us to a close when she returns shortly before midnight.

Friday 29 August

Shortly before we leave Friday Lane, Threycia’s cousin arrives with her two children. Threycia naturally lays on another feast, this time of chicken. There must be enough to feed a family of six for a week. I politely accept a second helping and wonder how I’m going to manage tonight’s barbeque at the Smiths.

With bursting stomachs, we squeeze our suitcases into Kev’s car and drive across Nottingham to leafy Wollaton, where John, Judy and the girls are expecting us. Emily and Natalie have both visibly grown up since we last saw them at the beginning of January. As we stroll in Wollaton Park, I let John and Kev catch up with each other while I chat with the girls about school and life in Nottingham. Emily’s as engaging and chatty as ever, but Natalie, now ten, is beginning to emerge from the shadow of her older sister. She has plenty to say, and we find ourselves in deep conversation as we steer around the lake, up to the Woolaton Hall, and back to Ashchurch Drive.

The mouthwatering aroma of barbeque smoke greets us before we reach Ashchurch Drive. While we’ve been in the park, Judy’s been busy grilling heaps of chicken and sausages. We all sit in the garden chatting and eating until Kev departs at sunset, then move inside as the almost-September evening turns cool.

We spend the evening leafing through photo albums of John’s travels in Mexico and Guatemala in the mid-1980s, quizzing him at length about travelling there. Clearly, the gap of forty years limits the relevance of John’s reconnaisance mission. Yet simply looking at forty-year-old photos of places we plan to visit is reassuring. In Guatemala, tourists have been showing up in Antigua, Lake Atitlan, and Tikal decades before I was even aware that such places existed. It’s approaching midnight before the conversation pauses for long enough for everyone to reflect that it might be time for bed.

Saturday 30 August

The Wollaton Ashes are moved up today’s agenda as Nottingham braces for a wet afternoon. For pre-match fortification, Judy rustles up a full English for six of us, and John encourages Emily and Natalie to ask K and I about our travels. They have plenty of good questions, but I’m not sure that I have plenty of entertaining answers. What’s the best place we’ve been? Er…. What’s the weirdest thing we’ve eaten? Er… If we could recommend one place to them to spend a weeek with mum and dad, where would it be? Er… Great questions, though!

We’re so busy chatting that we don’t hear Kev knock at the door. When I check my phone to see if he’s given an ETA, he’s left a message saying that he knocked a few times and when no one answered, drove back to Gedling. With Kev out of the match, this year’s Wollaton Ashes will be contested by two teams of three: John, Emily and Natalie will line up against Judy, K and myself. We bat first and notch up 27 runs from a 36-ball innings. As John steps in as final batsman of the day, his team stands on 12 from 24 balls. Twelve balls later, they’re on 30 and this year’s Ashes go to dad and daughters.

Rain is looming, but before we leave Woolaton Park, we need a photo op. In the courtyard of the museum, we find a table tennis table with bats and balls. There’s just time for a quick match before rain stops play and we all retreat under umbrellas to Ashchurch Drive for afternoon tea and cake, and to follow the Saturday afternoon football scores.

Later, we head out for a pub dinner. At both the Hemlock Stone and the Admiral Rodney, the kitchen is so busy that we’re apologetically told to expect an hour-long wait for food. We pivot, settlling for a drink at the Admiral Rodney and a trip to Woolaton’s local shopping parade for fancy takeaway burgers and onion rings. With another bursting stomach, I slump in front of Match of the Day and struggle to stay awake.

Sunday 31 August

The final day of August: a day to stockcheck the year to date before the calendar turns and autumn blows in.

It’s a day of goodbyes not only to summer but also to the Smiths. After another ramble in Wollaton Park with John and a delicious lunch of Judy’s salmon fried rice with fried chicken and eggplant coins, our Uber driver arrives to deliver us to Nottingham station. He’s a charming self-described British Muslim and has just come back from Morocco. He thoroughly approves of it as our upcoming destination. He claims many British Muslims are buying property in Morocco. He’d like to do the same, “But the language barrier….it’s difficult”, he laments.

Our train takes us up to Sheffield, then returns the way it came for some miles before striking west across the Peak District. Many years have passed since I last saw the Peak District. From the train window it looks modest and charming—not rugged and empty, as I hazily recall it from my university years. We get off in Stockport, from where it should be a 15-minute jaunt down the line to Macclesfield.

Then, that sinking feeling: the 17.33 service to Bournemouth calling at Macclesfield is cancelled. Of course it’s cancelled. Of course. A sullen jobsworth in the ticket office irritably informs us that we can take the 17.44 service to London Euston. But just as the train pulls into Stockport, we realise that its next stop is in Stoke, a good 20 miles south of Macclesfield. We have little choice and clamber aboard. I leave K with the suitcases and stride off in search of the train manager for some route planning advice. Fortunately, she’s entirely different from the Stockport ticket office wasp—pure Golden Retriever by nature. We’ll only be stranded in Stoke for a few minutes before we can head back north to Macclesfield.

So, for the first time since 2016, I briefly find myself in dear Stoke-on-Trent. Hurrah!

“Have you stayed at a Travelodge before?” asks the check-in clerk at Macclesfield Travelodge.

“No, this will be our first time,” I say brightly.

“Well, it’s very basic’, she warns, handing us the door card with a grave expression.

“Basic is fine for us,” I chirp as we wheel our suitcases into the hotel lift.

Travelodge staff appear to be trained to manage the expectations of first-time customers lest they storm back to reception demanding a wardrode and unlimited free wi-fi. But basic really is fine for us for one night before we begin our housesitting adventure. We unpack the bare minimum, then wander through a deserted town centre scouting the route to our housesit in the morning.

We need to eat, but our options look thin on Macclesfield’s deserted Sunday night streets. Fortunately, a pan-Asian restaurant not far from our housesit is full of satisfield-looking Sunday night diners and comes to our rescue. After a modest bowl of ramen and an adult refreshment, we wander back to our Travelodge. With limited free wi-fi, we turn on the hotel TV and watch whatever’s on. Watching real-time TV is quite a novelty. I fall asleep to the comforting murmur of British telly: grumpy doctors, murder in the moorlands, and all is well.

Monday 1 September

At eight o’clock, we leave Macclesfield Travelodge and wheel our suitcases through a still almost empty town centre to begin our housesitting experiment with Percy.

Before we can even knock, Percy’s owner Debbie opens the door to her Victorian two-up-two-down and greets us like old friends. We already know Percy won’t be here when we arrive—he’ll join us later when Debbie’s son Rik brings him home this afternoon after work. We have an hour with Debbie before she leaves for her cruise down to Portugal and Spain with girlfriends. She’s about my age, lively and vivacious, but was widowed three years ago. She bought this small terraced house to make a new start, decorating it in strong dark colours and opulent bird-themed wallpaper. The decoration, combined with the dim sun-starved rooms suggests the interior of a tasteful, upmarket bordello. Debbie makes us tea, shows us where to find what we need, and takes us through Percy’s routine. At nine o’clock, Rik’s boyfriend Matt arrives in his car to whisk Debbie to the train station. It’s just us now.

We unpack, shop for groceries, do our laundry, and wait for Percy. The weather tries our patience: every time I put the laundry outside to dry, it rains. The moment I bring it inside, the rain stops and warm Septmber sunshine bathes the back yard. This continues tiresomely all day until Rik and Matt arrive with Percy in the late afternoon. Unsurprisingly, Percy’s a little circumspect with us at first. But he soon settles on the back of the sofa and we sit with him as we read and study, getting used to each other’s company.

Shortly before bedtime, we venture outside with Percy for the first time. He doesn’t show any inclination to go far. “Once around the block is just fine for me, thanks”, he appears to be telling us. That’s fine with us. We retire for the night and Percy settles on the bed with us.

Tuesday 2 September

It’s our first full day with Percy. We take him up the road to West Park, keeping him on his lead. A trot around the park seems to be enough to keep him happy—for the rest of the day he’s happy to alternate between dozing and observing us with doggie curiosity. In the late afternoon, he summons enough energy to thrash his toys around for half an hour. And that’s about it. All evidence so far suggests that we’ve landed the perfect housesit in terms of pet care, even if the house is rather dark and lacking a comfortable space to work and eat.

I’m busy with boring but necessary admin jobs: I want to get all outstanding admin behind me before we arrive in Marrakesh two weeks today. During a particularly frustrating but ultimately successful encounter with my eTax account, I learn that I’ll receive a small salaries tax refund this year. A combination of poor HKSARG website design and poor wifi has left me spitting feathers, so I wander into Macclesfield town centre for some fresh air and decompression.

In the evening, we watch a Netflix documentary A Short History of the Moors, which brings together the history of Morocco and southern Spain in a coherent and accessible way. I still feel alarmingly underprepared for Morocco, but we’ll continue to make inroads these next few days.

Wednesday 3 September

Our second full day with Percy passes much like the first. Doggie demands for novelty and variety are limited, after all. I’m able to cross a couple more life admin chores from my to-do list. For the first time in a while, I’m beginning to feel on top of admin.

In the afternoon, we experiment with leaving Percy on his own for a couple of hours. Ian Curtis’ ashes are buried in Macclesfield Cemetry, which just happens to be adjacent to our local Sainsbury’s. (Yes, ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’, but just look at the very reasonable price for Mr Kipling’s reduced-sugar apple pies.) We pause to reflect at Mr Curtis’ memorial stone before popping in for groceries.

Percy’s happy to see us when we get back. We seem to be building trust. Later, we feel comfortable enough to leave him again for a short time to venture out for our regular Wednesday night meal. The Picturedrome is an old art-deco cinema that’s been converted into a hip foodhall. While other restaurants in Macclesfield are almost empty, the Picturedrome is buzzing with customers—and it’s only Wednesday night. It’s clearly doing well. We both order a bowl of khao soi chicken and an adult refreshment, and tuck in.

Thursday 4 September

It’s a grim, wet day. Stepping outside, Percy takes one look at the drizzle and declines to walk to the park. He settles instead for a quick loop around the block.

The weather eventually clears up. This time, Percy’s up for the park in the glorious sunshine despite the still-soggy grass:

I’m finally on top of much the life admin I’ve been trying to clear. Now it’s time to do some travel planning. We find a place on Lake Atitlan in Guatemala that seems to suit us. We’re not in a rush to go anywhere, so we nab it up to the last available date before it’s booked for a month—three weeks in total.

After dinner, we watch a documentary about the 1984-85 Miners Strike, Strike: An Uncivil War. Forty years on, the miners strike seems like another world. What I find hasn’t changed is my ambivalent view of it. At the time, I took a rather dim of both the NUM for its lack of a ballot of members before calling a strike, and of the government for its wilful destruction of tight-knit communities. Watching the documentary, my essential feelings remain as they were as a 15-year-old. The documentary focuses on the events at Orgreave in June 1984, how the confrontation was deliberately engineered by the Home Office, and how the police’s paramilitary tactics that day were deliberate and carefully planned. It’s visceral viewing, with men now in their sixties and seventies weeping at the trauma of that day.

On a brighter note, K receives a message from the good people at Leica informing her that her photo of a group of tourists on their way to Milford Sound earlier this year has been selected as a master photo for inclusion in the Leica Master Shots collection:

Friday 5 September

Today marks two years since we arrived in Athens to begin our new life of open-ended travel. That day increasingly feels a long time ago. Specifically, the sense of wonder that I felt on that first morning as I stood on the generous balcony of our suburban Airbnb, gazing out at the small park at the centre of our gritty neighbourhood. In many ways, it was an entirely unremarkable day: we slept, shopped for groceries, and explored the surrounding streets. But that day also bristled with a sense of adventure that I’ve only captutred a handful of times since. Not that I’m complaining. It just isn’t possible to live every day with that heightened sense of everything. Two years on, our lifestyle often feels a more-or-less normal way of life. But, of course, it isn’t.

Some days *are* more-or-less entirely normal, however. Take today: a walk in the park with Percy, a wander into Macclesfield to stock up on toiletries, buy a spare pair of light long trousers for Morocco, and get a new SIM card. Coffee and a flapjack on the way back. Some French study. Some Spanish study. Some reading (The Caliph’s House by Tahir Shah, who bought an old riad in Casablanca and moved in with his young family). And a photo opportunity:

The wifi is temperamental and needs rebooting several times a day. Tonight, we’re unable to get a sufficient signal to power the TV. Instead, we settle for watching on my iPad, balanced on a chair.

Saturday 6 September

Debbie’s son Rik is keen to borrow Percy for the day. We use the opportunity to hop on a bus deep into the Peak District, to the handsome spa town of Buxton. Passing a pub at the highest point of the journey, steam engine enthusiasts are enjoying a meet-up. Even from inside the bus, the acrid soot-filled engine smoke reminds me of Istanbul winters in the early 1990s—rasping but somehow exotic at the same time.

The bus descends through sheep-flecked pastures into Buxton, where we step off and immediately head for local landmark Solomon’s Temple, a Victorian folly atop a hill south of the town. As we admire the view back to Buxton, we fall into conversation with a local chap with a shock of pearl-white hair. He turns out to be the now-retired Director of Planning of the Peak District National Park. He points out the still-active quarries dotted around the landscape and laments a tough professional decision he had to make: granting permission to extend a local quarry, thereby preserving 50 local jobs, or denying permission in the greater interst of preserving the national park. He shows a geniune curiosity about our lives in Hong Kong before making a timely descent down the narrow staircase just as a riot of young kids are rapidly flooding the cramped viewing point. We follow not far behind and make our way back to Buxton in search of coffee and cake.

We still have a couple of hours before the last bus to Macclesfield—plenty of time to explore the historical heart of Buxton and wander its extensive Pavilion Gardens, where a wedding party vies for space with a flock of Canada geese. The last bus thankfully shows up and whisks us back across the moors as the low evening sun basks them in an autumnal glow.

Sunday 7 September

A wet, dismal day in Macclesfield. A good opportunity to file my UK tax return and do some travel research. Percy rejoins us after lunch. He’s occasionally bringing up bile—a bit revolting, but nothing to worry about providing that it clears up quickly.

I text Adam seeking advice about visiting Tikal in Guatemala. He responds by sending me his blog, full of his travel adventures of 20 years ago. I’ll need to get reading PDQ as it’s being taken down at the end of this month (the hosting platform is closing). By the end of the day, with some help from YouTube videos, we’ve worked out what seems to be a realistic plan for our trip up to Flores and Tikal.

Monday 8 September

In the afternoon, K and I strike out for the house where Ian Curtis lived (and died). We pick our moment poorly: as we reach the house, a non-descript mid-terrace, a woman in full goth garb steps out and into a car parked outside. Elsewhere in the immediate vicinity, a man is sitting in a parked car, and outside a house a few doors down the road two police officers are sitting in a parked police car, and two paramedics are sitting in a parked ambulance. It’s not a good moment to gawp at one of popular music’s most morbid landmarks. We make as if we’re simply strolling to nearby South Park, which is indeed what we do.

South Park is bigger and hillier than our local West Park. On this early autumn afternoon, with cut grass, fluffy clouds, and marvellous views, it’s a rather lovely spot. We pause several times and gaze at the green and pleasant land that surrounds Macclesfield. Then, with nothing specific we need to do nor nowhere specific we need to be, we stand for a long time watching the ducks, coots and swans going about their business in the park lake.

Our reverie is broken when a shadow falls over the park. Looking up, we see an ominous grey sheet of cloud drifting towards us. We retrace our steps, past Ian Curtis’ house (there’s no one around now—we stop for a quick documentary photo), and back towards Macclesfield town centre.

On the way, we pass a gloriously old-fashioned tiny ice-cream factory hidden away on a back street. An information board informs us that Grapelli’s has been making ice-cream locally since 1890. Its premises include parking for half a dozen ice-cream vans, a small museum, and an ice-cream counter. Through the factory window we can see a handful of staff, all at least my age, cleaning up after making today’s batch of ice-cream. The indoor ice-cream counter looks closed, but as we step inside a young woman with a thick mouth brace appear and greets us. We each buy a single scoop and sit outside slurping it, keeping one eye on the ever-thickening cloud overhead.

Our timing is near-perfect. Two minutes from the house, we feel the first spots of rain. I trot ahead to bring the washing in. The moment it’s inside, it starts raining heavily. But we’re dry, and so is our laundry.

In the evening: KPop Demon Hunters. I’m aware that this animated pop musical has been the big summer film this year. It’s on Netflix, so it’s a good opportunity to rub noses with the latest cultural zeitgeist moment. In terms of good battling evil, it’s hardly The Wizard of Oz. But it’s great fun despite some truly dreadful songs, many of which are currently clogging charts worldwide.

Tuesday 9 September

Today is our final full day of looking after Percy. It’s also a day for running errands. I have a haircut in a Iraqi Kurdish-run barber shop, where both hairdressers reveal they’ve recently had hair transplants—one as recently as two weeks ago somewhere in Iran near the border with Iraq (who knew that you can fly direct to Irbil from Manchester?) I physically post a birthday card to Ian for the first time in some years, and we come away from the local toy shop with a snuggle bunny to present to soon-to-be parents James and Rachel.

Back in Prestbury Road, we have our last evening meal and settle down to watch travel videos about Guatemala City. Although I was initially adamant that we’d all-but avoid the capital, I’m coming round to the idea that it’s safe enough for a couple of days in the right neighbourhood. We’ll keep researching.

Wednesday 10 September

Our housesit host Debbie arrives back shortly after lunch. We say goodbye to Percy and wheel our suitcases back to the Macclesfield Travelodge, where we chill until we feel hungry. After more Thai food at the bustling Picturedrome—probably our last chance for good Asian food for some months—we make our way to Macclesfield’s premier quiz night at The Society Rooms, a vast Wetherspoons emporium. It’s hardly full of quizzers tonight, but by the time we kick off a modest seven teams have tossed their hats into the ring. Three teams of four are solidly Gen Z, three others are Millennials, and us…we’re the sole representatives of Gen X.

It’s our first Speedquiz anywhere but Lamma. The Speedquiz app on my iPad still has us registered as ‘They’ve scoffed the lot!’, which goes down well with tonight’s Quizmaster. Jimmy B, as he styles himself, is excellent. A George Best lookalike in his 30s, he keeps everyone involved, interacting with every team, and updating us on the scores every few minutes. He also throws in a few bells and whistles that Adam, perhaps wisely, chose not to include in his Lamma Speedquizzes. These mostly involve the leading team having to answer (and losing points if they’re wrong). If either of the bottom two teams are fastest to answer correctly, they get to ‘spin the wheel’: a screen-based one-armed bandit that presents snakes-and-ladders style consequences, from being rocketed into first place to forfeiting thirty points.

It takes us a while to get our heads around all these frills, but we have to concede that it makes for good entertainment. It also makes it harder for the cleverest team to win—tonight’s team with the most correct answers actually finish last. (I’m assured they still win most weeks.) We get to spin the wheel just once, and find ourselves rocketed from second-to-last place into second place. We then somehow sneak into the lead. We’re still leading as Jimmy B delivers the final question. We get it correct, but we’re not the fastest and drop back into second place. It suits us fine: we walk way with £10 without the embarrassment of showing up as strangers and winning.

Thursday 11 September

The train journey as far as Birmingham is smooth enough. But just after new passengers have boarded at New Street station and settled into their seats, a voice announces that the train will terminate right where it is. Once again, the country that invented the railway abjectly fails to make a train run from its departure point to its destination.

Waiting on another platform for an alternative service, a Chinese woman approaches Kathryn to ask how to get to Oxford. She’s been booted off the same train as us and is thoroughly confused. We establish that she can get on the same train that we’re waiting for and we fall into conversation. She’s a teacher of ‘moral education’ (=CCP propanganda) at a secondary school in Xi’an and is in England to establish her pre-teen daughter at a school in Birmingham. She laments the inhuman hours that Chinese kids have to put in at school and hopes her daughter will be happier in Birmingham. China has a failing education system; we have a failing railway network.

Our train arrives and hundreds of our fellow stranded passengers struggle aboard. With our bulky suitcases, we’re inevitably consigned to standing all the way to Reading in the space outside the toilet.

James collects us from Reading station and drives us back to Woodley. Both he and Rachel—now eight months pregnant—still have some work to finish on their laptops, so we settle with a cup of tea and read until they can log off for the day. We walk Flora and settle down for an evening of chat about impending parenthood, family, travelling and the current dire state of Ipswich Town.

Friday 12 September

James has to work, but Rachel’s off today. The three of us walk Flora around the estate and the local park before Rachel drives us to the centre of Reading, where we have a lunch date with Pauline Cowling.

Pauline’s chosen a perfect place: a small independent cafe less than five minutes from the railway station. As always, we have plenty to catch up on. It’s only after we’ve said goodbye that I realise I wish I’d asked her whether as a Chinese woman living in England she’s noticed any slippage in the British reputation for reason, toleration, moderation, and decency since we last saw her.

The train from Reading to Basingstoke ploughs through a howling downpour of tropical intensity. But it’s just a local shower and Basingstoke’s dry, if gloomy, when we arrive. We check into the Premier Inn (new to us) and chill until Anna collects us and whisks us off to the Jeckyll and Hyde for a pub dinner.

This is the first time it’s ever been just the three of us, without at least one of Ian, Rachel or Sharon with us (and often grandkids too). It works well. There’s much more opportunity to let the conversation veer onto subjects that we might avoid in a larger group. We talk more about dad’s illness and passing than we’ve ever done. For me, and I sense for Anna, it’s a cathartic chat. I’ve been waiting for it for nearly ten years.

We return to Rambler Cottage for a cup of tea before calling a cab to get back to the Premier Inn (Anna’s no longer confident driving at night). Our driver lives on the corner of Sheppard Road and Morley Road: my old bedroom window would have looked out almost directly at his house.

Saturday 13 September

A day in Basingstoke. Despite the occasional drenching shower, the weather is just how anyone would want it when visiting their home town. I set off for an early morning walk, taking in all the usual landmarks: Sylvia Close, Hammond Road, Sheppard Road and Ferguson Close. Arun Court will have to wait until Sunday morning. Once K’s ready to go, we set off for a spot of targetted shopping: new shoes and t-shirts for me, a belt for K. The town centre looks more vibrant than it did when we visited shortly after Covid—partly because it’s Saturday and the precinct is busy, but there are clearly fewer empty shops than before. The variety of food continues to improve: we find a small Japanese restaurant for a lunch of teriyaki chicken yakisoba noodles and a bowl of udon soup noodles.

We hop in a taxi to Chineham to visit Richard Spurr, where we while away a couple of hours over tea and sticky buns. Talking family, I learn that Fay’s brother was the partner of a well-regarded showbiz lawyer by the name of David Jacobs, who died in mysterious circumstances aftrer declining to represent the Kray twins. You know someone for over 50 years and only belatedly come to learn these things…

Richard drives us back into town, where we’re due for dinner with Paul and Lucy. It’s the first time we’ve visited without either George (now 27) or Ellis (now 25) being there. As always, there’s much to catch up on and chew over. After a fine evening, it’s gone eleven before we step out into a surprisingly chilly September night.

Sunday 14 September

I start the day with a loop around Riverdene and Eastrop. As I pass 13 Arun Court, a lady in her forties is standing at the kitchen window. It’s the first time I’ve ever spotted anyone living in any of my childhood homes and I want so much to shout to her, “Hey! I used to live here when I was a kid!” But what can you do?

Alison, sans Jack, meets us at Andover railway station. We walk to the nearby ground floor flat she shares with Jack—brightly painted in parrot green and yellow—for a coffee. Alison’s on superb form for a woman who openly confesses she’s often on the verge of a nervous breakdown: witty, energetic, and full of stories. It’s no surprise that many of these stories involve her seperation from Chris, her difficult relationships with her siblings, and of course the never-ending drama that is being a full-time carer for a disabled twenty-year-old son. I have no idea how she copes. Not now and not at any moment in the past twenty years.

The three of us drive to nearby plush Stockbridge, where we manage a loop of the water meadows before the promised rain arrives. We stop at a pub for a fine, if long time arriving, Sunday roast and stroll Stockbridge high street under umbrellas ogling the shops selling venison pate and signs inviting customers to bring in their own trout in for smoking. SO23 is the second wealthiest postcode in the UK, after all.

After a final cup of tea back at her flat, Alison drives us back to Andover railway station and we say goodbye. It’s been absolutely lovely to see her.

We spend our last night in Basingstoke at the local Wetherspoons. I’m trying to get my head around the fact that we’ll be in Marrakesh forty eight hours from now. On a damp Sunday night in Basingstoke, it feels a long way away.

Monday 15 September

Before bidding farewell to dear old Basingstoke, I complete a hat-trick of early morning walks. This morning’s walk takes me through the War Memorial Park— rousing the ghost of my 22-year-old self wandering through the same park at dawn on the day I moved to Istanbul—and down Crossborough Hill.

With big bags hanging from their shoulders, two female teachers, both considerably younger than me, are arriving at what’s now styled ‘The Costello School’ (motto: “Enjoy Respect Learn”). It’s 7.30am. I’m thankful to be semi-retired.

National Express whisk us first to London Victoria, and then to Gatwick. We’re staying in nearby Crawley tonight, but a taxi to cover the 8km to our hotel will cost over £30. Instead, we locate Gatwick railway station and pay £8.60 to get us as far as the centre of Crawley. We then have to drag our suitcases over some seriously high-friction pavements for twenty minutes to reach our hotel.

‘Functional’ would be the most generous word to describe Barrington Lodge. From the outside, it’s a handsome, Edwardian, mock Tudor structure. Inside, to be fair, the fixtures and fittings have been modernised since the lodge was erected. But the most recent renovation appears to date from circa 1975. The wardrobes, desk, and curtains all seem to have been salvaged from the local municipal waste depot. The kettle is grubby, the carpet is ugly, and our view is a small patch of scrubby waste ground. Still, the bed is large and comfortable. And, as if to deflect attention from the otherwise parlous state of the room, there are two incongruously stylish works of art on the walls.

It’s our final night in Blighty for the next fifteen months. What could be more English than popping into the local Wetherspoons for dinner? Basingstoke Wetherspoons last night. Crawley Wetherspoons tonight. Let no one accuse us of living a life of shameless glamour. Back in ‘Barrington Towers’, we settle down to watch Brian and Carrie’s latest YouTube video. They’re finding their way into London from Gatwick railway station. Cheaper than a taxi…