Paul & Sheila, Tom and Matthew – an unexpected visit

Posted on by Ian C.

On Tuesday night we had a phone call from Sheila, that they were thinking of visiting … immediately! With our trip to California and MINI Takes The States, we wouldn’t have much time to see them – but they were welcome to borrow our house and car … so yesterday they flew over!
By chance, they had booked flights from Newcastle to Boston via Paris, which with the current flight chaos in England was a good move. They landed in Boston only about half an hour late (compared with a British Airways flight from Heathrow which was listed as five hours late!)

Of course by the time they got to our house (in two cars – neither the MINI nor the Audi can carry six people!) they were tired, although the boys quickly became active again. We gave Paul & Sheila our room, which is big enough to put an inflatable bed down for the boys, and Margaret & I slept in the guest room (till Tuesday, when we fly to Monterey!)

This morning, with comfortable temperatures, lots of sun and blue skies, we sat on the deck – the boys enjoyed watching the fish and Tom was very interested in the different birds & the noise of the crickets …


Then, we took a trip to Halibut Point State Park:

 

Lunatic Rain

Posted on by Ian C.

Tonight it rained incredibly heavy, with wild lightning and thunder, for an hour or so!

Pat & Dave next door just had new drainage put in their garden, so they had soil instead of grass – the immense amount of water washed down soil from their garden into ours, and filled the pond with water and dirt! There was also so much rain that the gutters & drainage of our house (put in in 2001 after a flooded basement) was overwhelmed, and we had about 1/2″ water in the basement. Luckily we caught it before it got too bad, and nothing was damaged.