Our friends, Will and Carla, were over here from California. Will has created his own ‘Ideas’ garden over some years and is very knowledgeable on an enormous variety of plants, so it wasn’t difficult to make a decision about where to take them for a day out in the English countryside. I was very excited also because John and I hadn’t been to Sissinghurst – former home of Vita Sackville-West and her husband, Harold Nicolson, who created the gardens there in the 1930s – for many years.

Parking is in a field and the reception is ‘manned’ by lovely Kentish women volunteers, who all gave us an extremely warm welcome. There are different parts of the gardens, which revolve around the towers in the centre, where Vita made her study. The roses weren’t quite in bloom yet but there was plenty to enjoy, including the largest and most exotic paeonies I have ever seen for real. I wish I could grow them at home but I think they need an open aspect, with lots of sunshine. And we were blessed with sunshine at Sissinghurst on that Sunday. And also with the sound of many bees, a jar of whose honey came home with us.

Sissinghurst

In the pink…paeonies 1

In the pink… paeonies too

Exotic paeonies grace the ‘white’ garden

Under the tree where Carla had an afternoon nap

The Kentish ladies also offer a delicious lunch in beautiful rustic wood surroundings. While Carla became the sleeping beauty, the rest of us explored the library and climbed to the top of the tower. Although there were quite a lot of visitors, the soporific humming of bees added to the tranquillity and beauty of this historic and very personal place. I felt I could have come upon Vita tending to her paeonies, pruning in the nuttery or writing an article on gardening at her desk. It’s a very idiosyncratic garden, a haven created with much love and talent. Well worth a visit.

END

John was meant to have the week after Easter for holiday. The weather wasn’t encouraging – grey and with an east wind chapping at the extremities. I had thought I’d finished with wearing my scarf inside as well as outside but had to retrieve it from the winter shelf in the cupboard. And John finally arrived home with lots of unfinished writing to do. He said he’d like to be by a river, which sounded idyllic but the magic of sunlight on water on a warm afternoon with flashes of blue dragonflies whirring here and there, was, most probably, a distant dream… given the weather forecast.

I did, however, look up some enchanting sounding places by rivers, using Alastair Sawday’s wonderful guides but in the end we opted to go and see John’s parents in the Cotswolds towards the end of the week, when John had caught up with his heavy schedule. Meanwhile, we had an afternoon in Kew, which was bursting with blossom and lunch at The National Gallery. John was delighted with the position of our table, which gave him a chance to take a photograph of the statue of Sir Keith Park (in Trafalgar Square) from an interesting angle! Otherwise, I directed the decorator who had arrived in Barnes on Tuesday morning, bright eyed and brush in hand. It lifted my spirits to see things getting freshly painted.

I’d been reading a poetry book = Evergreen Verse = which I’d come upon when emptying rooms, ready for painting and there were a number of poems I found, all of which I would put in my list of favourites. There is one called ‘Adlestrop’, written by Edward Thomas (1878 – 1917). The village of this name is very near Stow-on-the-Wold in Gloucestershire and about twenty minutes drive away from John’s parents’ house. The poet was on a train on the 23rd June, 1914, when it made an unscheduled stop at Adlestrop station. The poem is timeless, the moment in summer eternally captured. I had to track it down.

ADLESTROP

Yes, I remember Adlestrop–
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express- train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.
The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.

No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop – only the name
And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

EDWARD THOMAS 1878 – 1917

I finally managed to persuade John to come with me. The sun was out and we drove through the busy streets of picturesque Stow and past The Oddingtons. Adlestrop is a tiny village with a population of about eighty people. There are two vast houses, a pretty church and small Cotswold, honey coloured houses with cottage gardens. I called at the Post Office, which is tiny and belongs to the 1950s. It was closed between midday and 4 pm. A sensible time for lunch followed by a nap, I supposed. The only people around in the village were wearing knapsacks and looked like tourists. I couldn’t see any evidence of a train station, although there was a strange, old fashioned sign at the start of the village in the fork of two roads, showing ADLESTROP.

Later on, I tracked down the story. Adlestrop station used to be between Kingham and Moreton-in-the Marsh. It was axed by Dr. Beeching in 1966. The old station sign and an erstwhile platform bench now serve as a bus stop in the village. It seems unlikely that a bus ever appears. The poem is inscribed on a metal plate attached to the bench.

Apparently, Jane Austen made several visits to Adlestrop, where her uncle was rector and it is believed that the house and grounds of ‘Adlestrop Park’ were the setting for her novel ‘Mansfield Park’.

I hadn’t shown John the poem beforehand. I should have done because after reading it, he decided to do a blog on the afternoon we spent there. On rereading it myself, I found the poem even more poignant, as Edward Thomas didn’t live to see his work published. He died in action during the First World War. I love the simplicity of this poem and the strength of feeling it awakens in me. It is as if I am holding the poet’s hand across the years and at the same time living in an infinite dimension of shared consciousness.

Edward Thomas, 1878-1917

END

We had an amazingly deep fall of snow in Barnes this winter. However, Spring seems to be in the ascendant at last and here are a few images to prove it.

Barnes pond in Spring

Church Road, Barnes

This last photo shows part of Barnes Green. Opposite lies a row of shops, which includes our only greengrocer (Two Peas in a Pod), Victoria’s for fresh bread, healthy salads, cakes, jams and many other delicacies, a chemist, a travel agent, a dry cleaner’s, three clothes shops, a small supermarket open all hours and Natsons, our award winning newsagents, who we couldn’t do without in our house. Papers are delivered without fail every morning. We used to have a wonderful art gallery which came to the end of its lease and has sadly closed.

Fifteen minutes by car brings you to the Isabella Plantation in Richmond Park. This is an enclosed area within the park, which has flowers, shrubs, trees, streams and pools. It is a place of peace and tranquillity at any time of year and good to visit throughout the seasons.

A pool off the beaten track, Isabella plantation

Skunk cabbage, Isabella plantation

Spring, Isabella plantation

Contrasts, Isabella plantation

Isabella duck and wife …

Family group with onlooker, Isabella plantation

This must surely be an Ent from ‘Lord of the Rings’…

He is old and has bad teeth!

Complementary colours, Isabella plantation

Both rhododendrons and camellias are native to south east Asia but were brought by plant hunters to northern climes, where many have survived and flourished. They are mostly evergreen with glossy leaves, and clusters of showy flowers in Spring. Camellia flowers are more rose like in shape and remind me of the painted flowers in ‘Alice in Wonderland’. Both shrubs have many varieties and of the camellias, ‘Camellia sinensis ‘ is the most valuable, being the tea plant.

Rhododendrons, Isabella plantation, Richmond Park.

Intensity of colour, Isabella plantation

Camellias, Isabella plantation

Time to go home …

Kew Gardens are about fifteen minutes drive from Barnes in the other direction and we made a short trip there soon after to see an outdoor exhibition.

Spring blossom, Kew

DNA sculpture by Charles Jencks, Kew

Three giant poppy heads, Kew gardens

Curiouser and curiouser…

A boggler… the mind boggles…

Spring promises…

Yellow and blue – a perfect match

This last photo was taken in John’s parents’ garden a couple of weeks after we had been to Kew. The colour of the sky and the warmth in the picture make us look forward to what lies ahead.

‘I’ll see you again,
Whenever spring breaks through again’ (1929 song, Noel Coward)

‘I believe we should all behave quite differently if we lived in a warm, sunny climate all the time’ (Brief Encounter, 1945, Noel Coward)

The country habit has me by the heart,
For he’s bewitched for ever who has seen,
Not with his eyes but with his vision, Spring
Flow down the woods and stipple leaves with sun.
(‘The Land’ (1926), Vita Sackville-West)

END

When icicles hang by the wall,
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,
And Tom bears logs into the hall,
And milk comes frozen home in pail,
When blood is nipp’d, and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-whit, To-whoo
– a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doe blow,
And coughing drowns the parson’s saw,
And birds sit brooding in the snow,
And Marion’s nose looks red and raw,
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-whit, To whoo
– a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

Deep midwinter

The Thames has been flooding over the banks at high tide and so our walk turned out to be muddy as well as cold to the bone. Muffled up with scarves, gloves and hats and a big padded winter coat, so constituting a formidable defence against winter’s icy grip… Even so, sometimes I feel my brain gets too cold to think and I might as well be a snowman.

We took the turn at the Church Road/Castlenau crossroads along Queen Elizabeth Walk, with the entrance to Barnes wetlands on our left, the playing fields to our right. It’s straight on to the river bank and Harrods old Depository, which is now reassembled into luxury apartments with beautiful, watery views of the wetlands and the river. If I was a birdwatcher and lived in London, a flat here would be paradise – along with a powerful telescope by the window. It’s a desirable location, in any case, both for people, birds and other wildlife. The Barnes Wetlands – a significant stopping off point for migrating birds – are very worthwhile a visit. They are open throughout the year. A number 283 bus from Hammersmith takes you right to the entrance, just off Queen Elizabeth Walk.

We alternately strode along, then gingerly tiptoed through the muddy bits, jumping here and there to avoid über-squelchiness and deep puddles. Runners and dogs splashed by, oblivious of their constant spatterings far and wide. Grrrr…

To walk under Hammersmith Bridge you have to bend your head. I took these photos from the Barnes towpath side. One of them put me – very slightly – in mind of Vermeer’s ‘View of Delft’. Perhaps it is because of the Rotterdam Gate with its turrets, which are reminiscent of Hammersmith Bridge here, both of them on the right of the picture. But I think it is more the limpid, reflective quality of the water stretching across in front of the buildings on the far shore. A replete stillness which calms the restless mind. Vermeer somehow manages to capture this invisible essence in many of his paintings.

Barnes towpath – looking across to Hammersmith

Hammersmith bridge in late afternoon sun

Hammersmith Bridge – girders

We tramped doggedly on along the towpath towards Barnes Bridge until we got as far as the Swedish school. There we branched off to the small reservoir, hidden from both the river and the road by the treeline. That’s where I took the photo of the cold, peaky looking heron perched on its small island, just a little way on from the bank of rushes.

Reed beds, small reservoir, Barnes

Reflections of a cold, beaky heron

Then we let ourselves out of the squeaky iron gate onto Lonsdale Road and were home in under fifteen minutes. Hot mugs of tea and buttered crumpets with plum jam made all the muddy puddles seem worthwhile.

END

I’d been at the Royal Academy looking at the Anish Kapoor exhibition – which left me on the whole ambivalent and slightly deflated, and with offended housewife syndrome to boot! I want to add that there were also two or three joyous pieces. But I did unreservedly enjoy the sculpture in the front courtyard and imagine that many people cloned their own reflection in one of the balls, getting the same result as me…

Silver balls – spot the photographer…

With the exception of one or two days plus some snow, the outside world was grey. We ventured out to Richmond Park one afternoon and were rewarded with a rare dose of sunshine and blue skies.

Winter blue sky

Walking along the wide ride which leads up to the Royal Ballet School, I came upon this rose, tucked into the branches of a tree. I wondered whether it signified a sad or happy memory or whether it was just done to boost the joys of warm colours, which we have been missing.

A rose without a thorn…

Somehow, the sun and the colour of the sky heightened the colours in the woods too.

Here be monsters …

Monster number two …

On the homeward trail I came upon this ancient tree stump, covered in hoar frost and wondered whether any small animal had burrowed its way inside for shelter, as the middle seemed to be stuffed with dry bracken leaves.

Hollow tree stump

As the shadows lengthened, we made our way back home, feeling revitalised after so many long, dreary days under a grey blanket.

Remains of a sunny day – homeward bound …

END

John was invited to speak at a conference in Vienna. We had never been there but both of us had always wanted to go, so we decided to include the weekend and explore a little.

Easy flight, mild weather. I had booked a hotel I found on the internet. I’m always anxious about choosing places to stay because John is quite particular. Silence on his part indicates discontent, then descends into gloom. Luckily, this hotel passed the test! The façade of the building was old but inside was very modern. The room was huge and the slate walled shower that would have accommodated at least two people at once, reminded me of the architecture by Peter Zumthor at Therme Vals – a Swiss spa we visited some years ago. We were on the second floor. The bedroom had lots of warm wood against white walls. I noticed each room was called the name of a different vineyard. And there were bottles of wine set out for tasting. It was overwarm but we managed to turn the heating off and open the big, ceiling to floor windows, which looked out over a quiet street.

The sparkly girl at the reception desk had suggested a few places near at hand for dinner. I went to have a quick look round while John set up his computer and on the way back asked her if she could book us in at Kristians Monastiri. Already unpacked, I was now so hungry for my dinner, I hustled John to get ready. Dusk was filtering through the sky as we strolled along, taking in Vienna’s romantic, inviting ambiance. Added to which, it turned out to be a great choice of restaurant.

I slept fitfully as I was horribly exhausted. The decorator had just finished painting before we left, the fridge of twenty plus years had broken, the loo cistern had started to leak and the iron gave up the ghost as I was packing the cases. I’d had to pay through the nose for an emergency plumber but managed to order another fridge before leaving and thumbed said nose to the iron, as there was a brand new one in the cupboard, especially for an emergency like this. Ha! At least the paint will be dry when we get home and it was a job well done as some of those walls hadn’t seen a paintbrush in twenty odd years. Now they are looking as inviting as the name of the paint – Golden Rambler.

I’m beginning to feel quite like a Golden Rambler myself. Breakfast was delicious and I was ready to explore. Amazing how a change of scene, as long as it’s a good one, fills you with energy. John was fiddling with the computer but we were soon on our way to take Tram No. 1 to Radetskyplatz, where we would find the Hundertwasser Haus.

John has loved Hundertwasser since the sixties and we have had a poster of his on the wall all this time. Hundertwasser was an eccentric artist, who turned his talent to buildings also. They very much represent the atmosphere of the new and untraditional and of sixties liberalism. And there are no square corners. Hundertwasser wanted to design whole villages in this way together with sustainable forms of energy and there is a model of this at the gallery, where many of his paintings are on show. There are other examples of his architecture throughout Austria.

Hundertwasser Haus

John explores Hundertwasser Haus 1

John explores Hundertwasser Haus 2

When I think of it, Hundertwasser’s vision is so eccentric and so unlike anybody else’s art, that I can see why some people love him and others don’t in the least. The building he designed is lived in and used for social housing, as he would have wanted.

The art museum is wonderful. Old, wide planked mahogany, polished wooden floors which squeak and a small café, shop and rather wild garden down below.

It’s certainly very different from the traditional, fabulously grand and gracious buildings we were about to see next. The trams are so picturesque (see john’s blog) – and old- fashioned, with hard wooden seats. We liked them and they work well.

We made our way back to The Albertina art gallery, approached through pretty gardens. I had wanted to see the original of Dürer’s hare and asked whereabouts it was. BOF! The room was closed off for a private function. However, there was a huge ‘Impressionismus’ exhibition on, covering about a dozen rooms, with a wonderful collection of Caillebotte’s paintings, some of Bazille’s, along with the more celebrated Monet, Renoir, Pissarro, and Manet, Degas, Corot and other artists of that time. So many pictures I had never seen before.

The Albertina – side view

In the shop, John bought a book of paintings by Walton Fuller. Astonishing visions of flora and fauna…… incredibly beautiful and colourful and different, with shades of Hieronymous Bosch – nature red in tooth and claw etc. John always has a heavy book to lug around!

The afternoon was nearly over and I was rather keen to sit down in the Café Mozart, opposite The Albertina. John thought we should explore a little more, so we walked towards the pedestrianised centre by the Peterskirche and the Stephansdom. The Peterskirche is over the top baroque and rococo but in its way, fantastic. The Stefansdom is much simpler inside – the outside is astonishingly lovely. It was dark and I didn’t get good photos. However, we were entranced by all the Christmas decorations and lights. And I am always overwhelmed by the seas of votive candles flickering en masse…they always make me think of how fragile life is.

The Stephansdom

Reflections… spire, tree, moon, star, snowflake…

It was now well past teatime – unfortunately – but we found a small restaurant for supper called Wrencks in Bauernhofstrasse, just behind the Peterskirche. It was low key but good quality food, well presented. I had stuffed squid, with hash brown potatoes and roasted vegetables. John had a delicious beetroot soup and a glass of red wine. A few raindrops threatened as we walked back to the hotel, getting lost once or twice – so lost actually, that I fell asleep almost as soon as we got back, with the feeling I’d done at least half a marathon since breakfast. But it was a satisfied sort of tiredness!

John seemed to be having problems with his email. I was thinking that the office should look for a better provider but while I was contemplating this problem, I nodded off.

I woke up feeling good and well rested but can’t help feeling aggrieved at John’s constant communication with the office – even at the weekend. His colleague Geoff sent him a note, telling him to switch off his Blackberry, which continues to buzz away…like a trapped bumble bee. I know I am not the only wife to feel like this!

However, the day was bright and sunny and we took a taxi to the hotel where John would be re the conference. From there it was about a twenty minute walk to The Belvedere. There are two palaces here, joined by a vast formal garden, which are full of famous paintings, many by Klimt and Schiele. The trees and bushes in the gardens are topiarised (if that is a word). Hundertwasser would see them as ‘tortured nature’!

There are lots of sphinx-like female statues throughout these gardens. Each one has a different face. All have large breasts, which are obviously stroked lovingly and with great satisfaction by many people passing by, as they are a slightly darker shade to the rest of the icing sugar white of the statue.

Do you prefer …. 1

Or maybe 2…

Or perhaps 3 will fit the bill…

Klimt’s paintings are like sensuous jewels and ‘The Kiss’ did not disappoint. We both liked a painter called Moll. Especially a painting of a river flowing between heavy, lush green undergrowth. Egon Schiele is very talented but not my favourite. Having spent an hour or so looking at paintings, I espied a rather exquisite, domed café at the side of the main building and was able to tempt John to join me. If you look at the photograph below carefully, you may notice an unwelcome third party…

Café life – Viennese style

After a ‘kleiner brauner’ with cream and cake I was happy to take advantage of the sunny day and here are some of the places we got to see on our travels around the centre of the city..

Sunlight

Communing

Angels and dolphins

Eagle gateway

I just had to have a little time to go shopping and on the way, as we were passing under some arches, there was a strong, warm aroma of stables. This is where the Lipizzaner horses live – right in the centre of the city. I was fortunate enough to glimpse one, looking out of her stall.

Lipizzaner horse

Mysterious banana

When I got to the shops

Putting on the style

Consuming angel

The welcome party

Christmas presents

We were now beginning to flag. Luckily, the way home was by The Albertina and opposite lies the Café Mozart, which looked scrumptiously unmissable. And when we finally sat down and had their special Apfelstrüdel with coffee and cream, I felt much revived. Angels seemed to be popping up everywhere…

Café Mozart angel

We made our way back through the gardens at the back of The Albertina to our hotel. It was quiet except for a few night birds chit chatting to one another as they made themselves comfortable in their roosts. Suddenly I realised that we were alone and that the railings were very high. The gates were about to clang shut for the night. I didn’t want to share the birds’ roosts and I ran towards the opposite side of the gardens, waving. We just made it!

Güte Nacht, Albertina

Rose gold…

Next day, it was time for John to work. Later on, I was very kindly invited to join the conference. I had a wonderful time and enjoyed meeting and chatting with many different, interesting people. I think they liked John’s contribution but I leave that to him to talk about. Just to say that the conference venue seemed to be in the grounds of the Schônbrunn Palace, where I got to sit in the new electric Tesla car – it looks like a Porsche. And later, John got to drive it round the grounds.

Closing time in the gardens

I very much liked the Viennese I met. We didn’t get down to the River Danube but we did pack a lot into a short time and it was worth every step of the way – including hobbling a bit! I brought home a spicy Christmas Stollen from Demel’s – another celebrated café, where the waitresses wear old-fashioned, black and white frilly aprons and most of them are – well – my age! The Stollen was excruciatingly expensive but it knocked the socks off any other Christmas cake I tasted. Just simply – scrumptious. Thank goodness I don’t live in Vienna because I would need a new wardrobe! And a treat just isn’t a treat unless it’s a rare occurrence… Vienna certainly has my vote!

END

The 19th September 2009. Up at 6.30 am, racing around to water my mimosa tree. The garden is in shadow and silent except for single crabapples falling haphazardly with a hollow bong onto the metal tray of the barbecue – but there is that sense of growing momentum, of the day opening up. The car has been borrowed by our daughters and is hopefully even now speeding towards the Channel Tunnel en route to the south of France. It will appreciate a good long run after being incarcerated so long in its city hutch.

Last bit of ironing, all switches off, loos flushed, cases bearing coloured ribbons in the hallway. Leaving home is always a nightmare for me. I don’t want to go, I think of all the things that could go wrong. The taxi arrives, the driver picks up our bags and we are dragged out of our burrow… it is agonizing. We turn the corner at the bottom of the street and all at once I have forgotten about our house. We are on our way.

It’s always best to look forward for the most part and my natural instincts seem to mainly work that way. Now I fiddle neurotically in my bag, checking passport and tickets. The ride to Terminal 3 is smooth and we arrive in good time. However, there is an enormous queue and a high percentage of lumbering bodies plonking around. I hope I am not sitting next to one of them.

I am rewarded with a window seat. Turkish Airways give us the best airline lunch I’ve had in a long time, finishing up with a piece of plum cake and a glass of cherry juice. All prettily presented and delicious.

SLIGHTLY SINISTER

Last week I went to see Francis and Christine Kyle at their gallery in Maddox Street. Ramsey Gibb, who shows his paintings there, has just completed five or six oils of Istanbul, which are to be part of a large ‘Byzantium’ exhibition, starting on the 11th November. There is one of the waters of the Bosphorus, which I think is outstanding. It’s edgy. Viscous, heavy water with a slightly sinister swell below a pinkish blue evening sky, silhouetting the dark minarets of a domed mosque on the opposite shore. I am unaware now that I will soon be sitting on a boat with this selfsame view before my eyes. John took a photo of it, which I must compare with the painting.

Three quarters of an hour to go. Some children are starting to squawk like jackdaws and the scene outside is rather Daliesque. Pale blue lakes and eruptions of cumulous clouds, like forts or fairy castles, rising out of an otherwise deserted landscape. I can imagine a posse of colourful, turbanned janissaries on horseback, flags flying, galloping across the white, pristine plain… far down below are countries I have never been to. Full of dragons, I expect.

The plane drones on and the sun coming through the window makes me drowsy. At last I can see the waters of the Bosphorus, alive with a myriad of boats, great and small. After interminable waits to get visas and find our bags, we are in a bus going to the city centre. Ribbons of scarlet flowers like supine snakes garland the middle of the dual carriageway.

Our hotel welcomes us in the lobby with drinks of soft, pastel coloured syrup. Mine is pink, John’s is appropriately green and there’s orange and blue to make up the disparate colours of the rainbow. Our room is on the sixth floor, looking out over the street, with a rooftop glimpse of the Topkapi Palace in the distance. There’s a shop/café on the opposite side of the street, selling all kinds of delicious sweetmeats. I am immediately seduced and can’t wait to be sitting at one of the inviting wooden tables outside. John is more interested in sorting out the various cables he needs for his computer.

There are two low, narrowish beds with firm mattresses. I lie down feeling completely flattened by the travelling and queueing. But happy and rather astonished to be here, in the heart of Istanbul. The hotel dining room is on the top floor, enclosed in glass with a spectacular view of the Golden Horn. The mosques and bridges are illuminated at night and the anticipation of what lies ahead tomorrow is almost unbearable – especially as I am so dog tired at the same time. Luckily, I am completely blotto as soon as my head touches the pillow and stay that way until the dawn wakes me, lighting up the cherry and ochre petals of the large green stemmed flowers on the curtains.

This is going to be a long entry – but, of course, you can skim it……..

I skim things all the time because there’s just so much interesting information around and I am, by nature, a fast and greedy eater of words as well as all sweet and toothsome delicacies. But now I’m on the other side, being the writer, it’s rather shocking to think how quickly somebody can skim what it took so long to write. Perhaps you’ll get the feel of atmosphere at least…… suffice it to say that Istanbul is now right up there in lights at the top of the tree for me. Before and after can often completely change your attitude to a place – in a positive or negative way. Moreover, there are some places that are not even on my list to visit – ever. I have always been curious about Istanbul, but not knowing Turkish made me hesitant. However, Hania had said I must go and her insistence was the catalyst in making me do it.

Winging to Istanbul

Aerial view, Istanbul

OUT AND ABOUT

On the first day, Çamil, our esteemed and very knowledgeable Turkish guide, takes us to an old area of the city………

First day exploring

Gravestones

The first picture shows wall paintings – one of whirling dervishes. In the second, the turbanned gravestones indicate men, those with veils belong to women. The number of flowers carved on the veil shows how many children the woman bore. A fez indicates a public servant.

John is adopted by a cat which falls asleep on his lap. Not a devotee of cats, nevertheless, they all seem to be drawn to him…

John with a ginger devotee

I don’t know how long Maison Bertaux has been running but I’ve been going there since the 1970s. I took these photos of it last weekend. It has recently expanded and been spruced up. I was on my way to a ‘pearl knotting’ course at ‘The Bead Shop’, just by ‘The Ivy’ restaurant. Maison Bertaux supplied me with a delicious petit déjeuner en route.

Maison Bertaux, Soho

Treats in Soho

More treats

Birthday flowers

This is the first entry I have done by myself, with no help from anybody so it’s quite a special moment! It also encourages me to start on my first ‘knotted pearl’ necklace. The day course was very enjoyable and I seemed to get the hang of it by the end. Practice etc…..

END

John had gone to Lausanne the day before. I had ‘flu and was relieved that I could stay in bed and also that he might miss getting it, having left the Krankenhaus. On Monday morning I couldn’t believe my eyes at how much snow had fallen in the night. It was pristine and untouched in the garden, except for fox and bird footprints, which were quite intriguing to track. The nocturnal life of the garden unveiled!

Even though I was ill, I felt I had to go out with my camera and capture all this – especially to show John, who would miss it all. It came to pass that Heathrow shut down and many flights in the next couple of days were cancelled, including his. He was finally rerouted home via Lyon and Paris. I had my trusty book, ‘The Man in Seat 61’ and could have got him home much earlier, as there are five direct trains from Lausanne to Paris every day, where he could have got the Eurostar home. Costwise, this would have been more expensive than to stay with BA’s disrupted timetable – but not that much more expensive. Anyway, I was quite annoyed that the travel agent Volans use seemed to think there were no direct trains from Lausanne to Paris. I rang SNCF, just to make sure they were wrong. They were. I think a ‘polite word in their ear’ might keep them more on their toes? Travel agents are in the same category as accountants. There are non-creative and creative ones. Why do we not have the latter?

But now I was free to go out and take some photos of Barnes in the snow. Not only was it beautiful but people were out with their children, dogs were leaping around madly and, in general, we were all just enjoying walking around wrapped up in our woolly hats and scarves. And the amazing thing was that everybody was smiling and greeting one another. For a day, the snow in Barnes lifted all our spirits. I tramped around happily and here are one or two photos I took. The last one, of Barnes Pond, was taken a couple of days later, so you can see the snow has melted but I’ve put it in because it’s very colourful…..’Can Spring be far behind?!’

01/02/09 Snow in Barnes

02/02/09 The winter garden

Barnes Common

Giant snowballs in Barnes

Barnes Pond