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Published: July 31st 2011
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Murray Mount
The crowd settling in for a long day in the sun After returning from our busy weekend on the southern coast, life didn’t slow down as I had two tickets to Men’s Semi-finals’ day at Wimbledon. Hannah was quick to snatch the spare ticket and we heading off for a relaxing Friday off work. We explored the different courts and watched a few different matches before planting ourselves on Murray Mount (or whatever British tennis player of the time is influencing the name, i.e. it was Henman Hill) with some Pimms and Lemonade and Strawberries and Cream. Not a bad way to spend a Friday. Despite not seeing Roger Federer (having already been knocked out), it was a great day, and start to the weekend. The following day carried it on as Hannah, Ben, Clay and I made the trek out to Milton Keynes to see the Foo Fighters. It was the third time I have seen them live and again they were brilliant.
The next weekend, Clay and I headed over to Ireland just outside of Dublin for the Oxegen festival. It had an incredible line-up of musical acts and neither of us had ever really done the proper festival experience. I’m especially glad we chose here as we were
Court One #1
Watching the mens doubles semi finals celebrities for the weekend as we were some of the very few non-Irish people around, especially when we said we had come all the way over from NZ because we were musical talent scouts for Big Day Out…... Clay especially got to know some of the locals quite well, even if he couldn’t match up to their famed drinking abilities. One of the big highlights of the weekend was a NZ band called The Naked and the Famous who almost brought the tent down with their set. After 3 full days of music, drinking, mud and whatever else we dragged ourselves back to London for much needed showers and sleep. I pity anyone who was sat near us on the plane!
Continuing with the busy weekend’s theme, I was away the next weekend down exploring Cornwall with Hannah, Kristin, Ally and Jodie. My Dad questioned my sanity in going on a weekend long road trip with 4 women, but I survived. Our first stop on Friday night was Okehampton just north of Dartmoor National Park. In the morning, we were up and out of there early across to see Tintagel, famed for potentially being the site of King Arthur’s
Court One #2
Hannah at Court One Camelot. The weather was pretty atrocious and standing on an exposed rock near high cliffs isn’t the best idea in driving wind and rain, but despite that I quite enjoyed the walk around. We had lunch there, including trying Cornish pasties and I don’t think anyone was really impressed. They definitely don’t beat a good old Steak and Cheese pie from a NZ bakery!
From there we headed down to St Michael’s Mount, which is the twin of a town on the northern French coast called Mont St Michel. Funnily enough a group of us (including Hannah) visited Mont St Michel over our trip to Paris for New Years a few years previous. It was just as dramatic as its sibling and despite it being high tide and not being able to go over there, I enjoyed walking bare feet along the beach and walking through the salt water. Again the weather foiled the opportunity for a swim.
After this we headed down to Land’s End and Penzance (no pirates unfortunately) for some photos before stopping off in St. Ives for dinner. It was a quaint little seaside village which had some very well known Fish and Chip
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Us watching the soon to be champion Novak Djokovic restaurants. We duly obliged and had dinner overlooking the harbour. Though I was lucky to survive until dinner as I almost knocked Hannah’s camera into the sea – despite 6 years of martial art training, I’m pretty sure I would not have been able to fend off that attack!
Before it got too dark, we travelled along to Looe where we stayed the night in our own little cottage. We were treated to a first class English breakfast in the morning by the owner while she regaled us with stories about the ‘Beast of Bodmin Moor’ – apparently a family of puma/jaguar type animals that live in the National Park and steal livestock. From Looe, we headed down through No Man’s Land (where I wasn’t allowed in the photo), and around the coast up to Newquay where we wandered around for a bit before heading up to Padstow. We stopped in here for Cornish tea (definitely not Devonshire tea……) before making our way back to London. It was another busy and successful weekend away. Next weekend, Stratford-upon-Avon……
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Clay
non-member comment
Oh you bastard...
!!!!!!!! Doh.