We arrived at the farmhouse mid afternoon on Wednesday and tried to familiarise ourselves with everything.  It’s a big place with lots of sheds, workshops and storage as well as being a substantial house. The modern kitchen/diner is huge – probably bigger than Danny’s flat – and a lovely place to work. We spend nearly all of our time here – cooking, working, reading, browsing, watching iPlayer etc. There’s a lovely big garden, a large sheltered courtyard with fishpond, a tennis court and open fields all around. All in all a real wow!!.

Around 6.00 the two dogs arrived – Riley and Hunter – and we are looking after them along with 7 chickens and the fish. We have a long list of instructions but it’s all very calm and straightforward and we have quickly settled into a simple routine.

We have had a good long walk every afternoon along the Suffolk Way which is very close, and spent a good amount of time in the garden keeping it tidy. I’ve also serviced the bikes, fixed Barb’s puncture and changed the tyres on my Tri-cross. I managed a short ride on Thursday to explore and discovered a superb cycle shop and destination cafe in the next village. How’s that for convenience?

We popped into Bury St Edmunds on Thursday evening for a recce and returned this morning – Saturday – for the market and a big shop in M&S. It seems like a lovely city – it has a cathedral – and appears lively and thriving with plenty of places to eat and lots of posh shops. The Arc shopping centre looks fairly new and there is a big cinema complex within easy reach. The Abbey Cinema also looks interesting with a whole host of cultural treats.

In addition to all this we’ve managed to do some work updating several sites and starting a new one for TK-Law Solicitors – an established client. The Summer newsletter is also about to go out – finally and our own site has had a well earned makeover.

Wednesday 20th

We are leaving Fordingbridge today  and moving to Makins Farmhouse near Bury St Edmunds. We shall be looking after 3 Golden Retrievers, 7 chickens and some fish as well as the house.  We are hoping the weather stays kind and we can get out for some good, long dog walks.

Yesterday was a final pack up day although I did get out for a long bike ride in the forest and we managed a nice walk with Bob & Gay in the afternoon. Our time in the New Forest has been lovely, the weather has been great and we’ve managed to have a really good explore. The flat has been a great base and this has been one of our best stays.

We drove down to Poole Harbour on Monday to meet up with Simon and Drenagh Wootton on their boat ‘Good Times’. It’s a luxury 50′ motor boat which offers cruises around Poole Harbour, Brownsea Island, Studland Bay and Swanage. The scenery is fabulous, the boat is lovely and Drenagh provided a delicious light lunch. It was a real highlight of our stay in the area – we loved it! They specialise in family get together and celebration cruises – birthdays, anniversaries, even the scattering of ashes.

We have been here now for nearly a week. We arrived last Sunday – travelling down in some torrential rain as Hurricane Bertha dumped the remains of her energy on the UK. It was nice to see B&G again – the last time was back in Spain in April. We all had lunch together, caught up with all the goss and went to the pub.

Monday was a work day – back up to Stratford to see clients – and so on Tuesday we headed to Hengisbury Head for a good walk at the seaside. We spent quite a lot of time in traffic jams and driving around Christchurch as I got used to the road network here. Things were not helped by a loose cow on the A38 which meant we sat for ages while the local police chased it down!

B&G set off for the Cotswolds on Wednesday and we began a series of walks in the New Forest. We have walked a different route each day and apart from being on the open heath in the middle of a thunderstorm it has been lovely.

We’ve also shopped at Waitrose in Ringwood and has a good look round Fordingbridge. The afternoons have been taken up with work – updating quite a few sites including our own.

Today, Saturday, we we went into Lymington and browsed the market as well as meeting up with Lizzie French who has a delightful website called Passing Whispers. We bought lots of goodies on the market and then headed back to the flat for lunch. I finally got in a bike ride in the forest and so a couple of beers at the end of the day felt well earned.

Tomorrow, Sunday, we are taking the train from Salisbury into London to meet up with Danny.

Where does the time go? We have been here now for over a week and are beginning to think about moving on at the weekend. Ann and Stuart arrive back in the early hours of Sunday morning so we shall be heading south to the New Forest to stay with our friends Gay and Bob.

We had planned to do a lot here and I suppose we’ve been lucky with the weather (again) but we get the feeling that time is not on our side and there is still loads of exploring to do.

This is a nice area, close to Ware and right beside the River Lea and the Lea Valley recreational park.  There are walks, cycle trails, river sports, loads of nice pubs and lovely countryside – just not enough time!

We have however seen family – Barb’s mum has been here nearly every day and we’ve taken her out and about with us. We’ve seen John and Chris, Andrew and Clare and of course Danny and Britt, who came for the weekend.

This house has just about everything but needs a lot of upkeep – Barb has been looking after the garden while I have cleaned and serviced our bikes (well, Danny did most of it). The dry weather has meant lots of watering and dead-heading in the garden although today it is raining – our first for many weeks.

The dogs are lovely and always with us. Rusty has become quite sociable and Oscar just wants to chase apples! We’ve also managed to set up the office and keep on top of work. When we do this, the dogs just come and sleep at our feet.

Danny and I did the Thetford Sportive on Sunday – 81 miles of Suffolk roads.  It was an early start and a lovely day but somewhat eventful, but that is a blog in itself.

We have however managed to arrange another housesit when we leave Fordingbridge. From the 20th of August will shall be looking after Riley and Hunter – 2 golden retrievers – in their Suffolk Farmhouse. More of this later.

We have now settled in at The Limes in Great Amwell.  This is our first venture into house sitting for a while and we are looking after a lovely big house in Hertfordshire with 2 Labradors for company. Rusty is 12 and Oscar is 2, nearly 3.

The owners, Stuart and Ann have been very welcoming and we arrived on Saturday a few days before their departure for a holiday in Turkey.

I’ve been for a couple of great bikes rides with Stuart to get to know the area and we’ve also been on several dog walks.  There are lots of cafés and pubs and some lovely walks along the River Lea.

We have also managed to see Barb’s mum several times and had a family BarBQ on Saturday so caught up with all the news.

The next 10 days will be more dog walking although Danny and I plan to do an 81 mile sportive out of Thetford on Sunday.

Its Barb’s mum’s birthday on Saturday so a birthday lunch is planned.

The 2 weeks in Warwickshire has flown by and we are now getting ready to move on. Distiller’s Cottage has been a good base – very quiet, comfortable and a  great location for catching up with clients and friends.

We’ve spent our time doing trying to recover from the 8 months in Europe and largely re-stocking ready to go again. We had visits to the dentist, the doctors surgery, the opticians. Trips to Boots, Halfords, Cycle Studio, M&S, and Waitrose.

Visits to friends have been lovely – we had an overnighter with J&M last weekend and then a day trip to Leicester to see John & Ann. Bike rides with Shipston Cycling on both Sundays have been great and a short ride around the roads of Wigston with John have kept me fit. We also had good walks near Whatton with J&M and in Leicestershire with J&A.

The big news is of course the car. After further investigation it was decided that there were too many problems to make repair viable. Fixing an old car is always a dilemma so we took the decision to look for something new.

Warwick Tollbar, our local Volvo dealership, have been great. They have lent us a Volvo V40 while things have been sorted out and having chosen a vehicle on Tuesday they have added a tow bar and roof rails and readied the car for collection today. We have chosen an XC60 – a bit smaller than the old XC90 but certainly more economical.

The Volvo is back in Warwick. It arrived on the back of a trailer all the way from Hamburg. It was nice to see the old girl again – we emptied out all our luggage that we had abandoned and removed the roof box and bike rack.  We now await the prognosis!!

We wanted to catch our friends the Tyms in London before they returned to Australia ( 7 weeks on a cruise!) – Friday 11th was the only possible day at lunchtime.  So, having booked two nights hotel, I couldn’t resist organising all sorts of cultural delights to make the most of a two days in London.  While Derek was completing his epic M25/Channel Tunnel car swap plan in the early hours and Britt was completing her swimming preparation for Sunday’s triathlon, Danny and I had a calm Friday morning strolling around Wimbledon village.  Danny treated me to breakfast at the artisan bakery and showed me round the shops and Wimbledon Common.  Amazingly, we all (including Derek) made it to Vauxhall on time to meet Tony and Robin for a catch up chat and lunch.  They were on great form despite Tony having a broken rib!!

On to Hampton Court Palace for the flower show – a nice stroll round but very crowded.  Back in Wimbledon, Danny and Britt took us for supper at The Rose & Crown before leaving us to catch the train back to Kew Bridge.

One last day of fun – the Matisse Cut Outs exhibition at Tate Modern, lunch at the BFI and The National Theatre to see Great Britain.  All excellent – a real culture catch up after our travels.  All we had to do now was drive up the M4 and M40 in a big van to Warwickshire.  We arrived at Distiller’s Cottage in Blackwell at about 8.30pm for a two week stay when hopefully we’ll be re-united with the Volvo and the rest of our luggage.

The German hire car had to be returned to Lille Europe. So we had a simple plan in place to achieve this.

Once at Travelodge I picked up a rental van and we transferred all our luggage leaving the hire car empty. We then set off for Regents Park Open Air Theatre to see Hobson’s Choice. The play was good though the highlight of the evening were the burgers. After days of hotel food and ham & cheese baguettes, the Regents Park cheeseburger was awesome.

After the performance we headed back to Waterloo with Danny & Britt and then split up – us to Kew, them to Wimbledon. Back at Travelodge we prepared for the next step. A few hours sleep, up at 4.00 and drive the hire car back to Lille via the tunnel. The 6.50 crossing was on time and despite yet more rain all went smoothly. I was in Lille by 10.00. Things started to go a bit astray when I discovered the rental return was nowhere to be found. I eventually discovered it 3 levels down in a multi-storey car park. GITS!!

Eurostar was just upstairs however and I was booked on the 11.36 to St Pancras. All on time and I was on my way back to London, scheduled to arrive at 11.57.

We had arranged lunch with our Australian friends – The Tyms at 12.30.

I am actually writing this in the tunnel so if lunch goes according to plan it will have been a successful mission. The fun doesn’t stop however. We are at the Hampton Court Flower Show afternoon session (3pm – 7pm). I have a feeling a few beers will pass my lips this afternoon.