We had an appointment for a massage this afternoon about ten miles from Kingham. Our "satnav" (GPS) insists on charting The Shortest Possible Route to every destination. And, it turns out, that can mean through cart paths and cow trails, over footpaths and farm roads it seems. (Sigh) So rather than taking a 1 1/2 lane country road and connecting to the full, 2-lane highway, the satnav insists we go past Alfred the bull, through the chicken yard and skirt the duck pond to get anywhere. That said- I AM gaining much-needed off-roading experience here and I've found that simply closing my eyes tightly while hurtling past other vehicles offers a bit of peace of mind- if no actual protection.
The massage was... well... lovely, I guess. The woman is about our age and was raised in France by an English mother and French father until her fathers passing when she came to England at age 22.
Dinner tonight at The Plough consisted of snails and mushrooms on toast- lovely! No- really! Also a scotched quail egg and some mixed greens. We also bought a lamb pudding to bring home and cook tomorrow, while another trip to the market yielded pepper-smoked mackerel for Jane's breakfast tomorrow with buttered eggs, and a nice mix of mussels, prawns and squid to saute' in garlic buttered breadcrumbs for dinner tomorrow night.
The food here is actually QUITE wonderful! No, stop laughing. Really, it IS!
We also stopped by the local train station today to pick up a timetable and scout out trips to Oxford, London and perhaps Paris via rail. There are 12-15 trains daily through the local station, connecting this little hamlet to the entire world of Europe and the station offers two extraordinary benefits: 1- it's only 2 miles from the cottage, and 2- you can PARK your car there and not have to drive anywhere!
Tomorrow may mean a trip... somewhere. We'll see.
Now back to my favorite subject- driving in the UK. Here's what you need to picture; a 1.5-lane wide carriage path that winds and twists over hills and around blind corners obstructed by stone walls and 15-foot tall hedges. And then, because there are no curbs, shoulders or parking spaces anywhere-- people simply abandon their vehicle willy-nilly whenever they see something of interest or tire of jousting.
So you come over a blind hill or around a blind corner and there ahead of you are two unoccupied lorries and an orphan Land Rover fully obstructing your entire 3/4 of a lane; drivers nowhere to be seen! So you peek out around them into the head-on line of oncoming jousters and then have to quickly decide whether to charge or retreat.
To make matters yet more challenging, this happens on BOTH sides of the road simultaneously- so now you have to weave in a serpentine pattern between randomly abandoned vehicles obstructing first your lane, and then the oncoming lane of traffic. Nobody seems to think anything of it, with double-decker busses and huge farm trucks wildly careening in and out across both lanes between randomly parked vehicles. It's not like anything I've ever seen quite so much as a demolition derby or a figure-eight race track where every lap is a potential head-on collision or high speed side-swipe of stalled race cars abandoned on the track by their luckless drivers.
I'm trying to enter into the spirit of things here on the jousting paths each day and so I'm considering buying a horned Viking helmet to intimidate the oncoming drivers. The Vikings seemed well able to handle the English- at least until 1066, so perhaps my little mind-game will give me some small advantage out there. I want to see at least a flicker of fear in their eyes for a change-- instead of just the abject terror in my own eyes staring back at me in the rearview mirror!
I realize I keep dwelling on this driving issue, but it's what occupies most of waking thoughts and at least half of my night terrors since arriving here. I'm sure both the novelty and the adrenaline will soon pass and we'll move on to other topics but for now I'm obsessing over it, so bear with me.
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