Kevin and Jeni's Travels 2012

On Friday afternoon we drove to Little Waltham in north Essex to spend the weekend with our friends Steve and Carole. We had a good evening meal and good beer in the Dog and Gun pub nearby - the beer was from the Brentwood Brewing Company (yes, Brentwood)

On Saturday morning, it wasn't actually raining (just cold, damp and windy) so Steve and Carole suggested a walk through their local Lyonshall Wood where there are usually huge display of wild bluebells at this time of year - and there were

After the walk we drove across to Colchester to take a look at the new Firstsite Art Gallery, a wonderful building but as yet not a great display of art, unless you like 120 fire-bricks stacked 2-high on the gallery floor. From the Tate Gallery's web-site:

"Equivalent VIII by Carl Andre was bought by Tate in 1972 and featured in special displays in 1974 and 1975 without attracting much publicity. But on 15 February 1976 an article appeared in The Sunday Times about recent additions to the Tate's Collection, illustrated with a picture of Equivalent VIII. The sculpture, 120 firebricks arranged in a rectangular formation, an important Minimalist work, provoked uproar.

The Tate was ridiculed by many for, as they saw it, being conned into buying a 'pile of bricks'. Others defended the Gallery, recognising Andre as an important artist and arguing that the Tate has to be adventurous in order to remain a major player in the international contemporary art world"

Late Saturday afternoon was, of course, time for the FA Cup Final - well done Chelsea and, hopefully, "goodbye" Dalglish

Sunday morning was spent at the wonderful Wilkin & Sons Ltd headquarters at Tiptree. Their conserves, marmalades and curds and exported around the world. A great Essex institution, just like Maldon Salt

We drove 2 hours westwards to the small village of Stoke Bruerne on the Grand Union Canal to meet up with Terry and Carol, friends from Sydney, to investigate the purchase of a wide-beam canal boat

We all stayed at the Waterways Cottage just a few metres from the canal and 2 pubs - GBP75 per night including breakfast for a double room - that seems to be the average price in the UK these days. An excellent place and a very friendly host

The next morning, we all drove a couple of miles to the Blisworth Marina, home of the New & Used Boat Company who build new boats and sell second-hand boats (they have about 100 in the marina). Our choice was the 12' Emperor wide-beam

Basically it poured with rain for 5 days with really high winds and very low temperatures. We drove around a bit and spent a rain-free couple of hours on Tuesday back in Nantes in the Place Royal area and the Passage Pommeraye, opened in 1843

On Wednesday we drove to Brissac-Quince to visit the Chateau de Brissac, the tallest castle in France. You can only seen the rooms with a guided tour and the tour is just too long and not that interesting. The gardens looked very good but by the time we came out of the chateau, it was raining and freezing cold. It's not really worth the 10 Euro admission fee

We did have a very pleasant lunch in a basic cafe in the village - basic but 500 years old

By Wednesday evening, Jeni was really ill and with the forecast of more very cold, rainy days, we reluctantly called our German friends and cancelled our get-together with them in Rouen and decided to drive back as quickly as possible to the UK. Julian and Loani were spending their last few days in Paris before flying back to Australia, so on Thursday morning we dropped them at the train station in Nantes and hit the road. Our route home passed very close to Bayeux and as we had missed seeing the Tapestry last year, we decided to stop there (very cold and windy) for lunch and a good look at this amazing piece of embroidery

From there we drove in torrential rain until about 8pm and stayed in a very old hotel on the road towards Abbeville. Next morning it was an early start and a 3-hour drive to the Calais Ferry Terminal - it would have been 2 hours but we got lost (thank you Hertz) and ended up not being able to find a petrol station to top up the rental car (thank you Hertz, 2.95 euro per litre, twice the normal price)

A short walk (in the rain) took us the the terminal where a mere GBP59 bought us 2 one-way foot-passenger tickets to Dover, and from there a new rental car took us up to our temporary home in Suffolk where Jeni has remained for 3 days! And now, I seem to be catching that cold

Saturday morning we visited Loani at her kiosk at the Pour l'Amour du Fil textile fair and marvelled at all her wonderful art on display. From there we walked around the nearby canals and the around the outside of the very large Chateau des Ducs de Bretagne

After a brief rain-delay, I met up (Jeni's cold had really kicked in) with Julian and we had a walk around the Place Royale area, only to find the best wine bar in the world (Bistro La Provence) - many glasses of Muscadet were consumed. And we all came back there later, after dinner

Sunday was a very slow start - Jeni and Loani were quite ill and it was pouring with rain. We eventually picked up our rental car about midday and drove just a couple of kilometres within the city, to Les Machines de L'ile where the famous mechanical elephant resides (as well as lots of other mad mechanical animals and insects)

In the middle of the afternoon, we drove just 30 km to the Chateau de la Sebiniere in Le Pallet where we had rented a large house in the castle grounds

A 2 hour-drive via the Blackwall Tunnel brought us from Cockfield in Suffolk to Knole House in Kent. Knole is one of England's largest houses and it is called a calendar house, having 365 rooms. In the Orangery is the Buzaglo Stove dating from 1774 and one of only 2 left in the world. From there it was just a 45-minute drive to Gatwick Airport to drop off the car and board a Flybe flight to Nantes in France ($135 each one-way). We arrived at our hotel in the city-centre around 9pm and soon met our friends Julian and Loani who were in town for a big Textile Fair. The Ibis Styles Nantes Centre hotel was pretty good value for 70 Euros a night (including breakfast) but the rooms were the smallest I have ever come across. Unfortunately, Jeni was starting to get a cold and Loani already a bad one!