South Downs

This weekend started with a very enjoyable 'champagne tasting' evening at Quinny's on Friday. He & Rebecca were excellent hosts & it was very well organised. They had 6 mystery champagnes & sparkling wines which were covered up in wrapping paper. We were all given the tasting notes & had to try & match up each bottle with its description, & also give an estimate of what we thought it was worth full price. The bubbles ranged from Veuve Clicquot to fairly cheap cava. It was quite interesting, for instance there was one that Will & I really liked, & we guessed it to be around £30, & it turned out it was £12. A fair amount ended up being consumed as most people had bought an additional bottle to be drunk between the 'official' courses. The school's resident champagne diva Nat Jones got the highest number correct by guessing 4 out of the 6, but she was gutted that she didn't pick the Veuve! Will & I got a respectable 3 right.

Unfortunately I had to be up at 7am on Saturday morning for a trip to the South Downs with 30 odd fourth form students who were doing their bronze DofE assessment. I did spend a lot of Saturday feeling a bit rough, & it took a nice afternoon nap in the sunshine whilst check-pointing to sort me out. It was a really nice weekend; the weather was great & the kids were fantastic. Their behaviour was brilliant & they all managed to follow their routes & timings correctly, making it a lot easier to check-point them along the way. It is a lovely time of the year & I came across lots of gorgeous bluebell meadows amongst the woods.

We got back at around half-5 Sunday evening & I popped around to Steve & Kate's for a glass of pimms in the sunshine. Unfortunately I just missed Willem who was down for a visit. He started at his new school in London after Easter. If you're reading this Willem -am missing you dude!

Monday night I checked out Claire & Mike's new house which they have bought. It's in Arborfield, so only about 5 minutes drive from our place. It's a lovely place they've got, they really have done well for themselves. I have earmarked one of their spare rooms for Will & I when we are homeless in the 3 weeks before we fly back to NZ at the start of September!

No other news, apart from the touch rugby season starting tomorrow night which I am looking forward to. Have been for a couple of runs on my knee so I'm fairly confident that it will cope OK.