John had Percy for the weekend, and with an invite for a summer solstice party in hand, we all jumbled in the car and headed off to Wales! After a two hour drive we arrived at Meli & Steve's place just outside Newport, a supremely gorgeous house on even more beautiful gardens, very typical cottage-garden, a riot of plants and colour, textures and scents. Nat, you would have loved it! See photos below. When we arrived the weather was pretty ballsy (ironic for a summer solstice party), but our hosts had a marquee set up with plenty of alcohol and a whole lamb roasting on a spit- so we were set, regardless of the rain! About a dozen of us were there, all lovely people, but such a mish-mash of people! As John pointed out, we sounded like the start of a terrible joke "A Scotsman, a Welshman, an Englishman, an Australian and an Indian walked into a marquee..."
We had a fabulous night eating food, drinking, listening to music and meeting new people. Percy had the typical Enid Blyton escape-- he mushed around in gumboots all weekend, collected eggs, rode horses, played with dogs, climbed tree houses and ran around the garden -- oh, to be six again! After saying a sad goodbye to our two lovely and generous hosts, we followed Meli's directions to Raglan Castle, just on the off chance we would enjoy it... She obviously hasn't met Harry. It was actually one of the best castle ruins I've seen (and I've seen a LOT thanks to H), quite a bit still standing and plenty of atmosphere to ignite the imagination! Meli called it quite a "new" castle, but then she's an archaeologist so I suppose the medieval times are relatively new in her persepective! At one point as we were coming back up some stairs, John says "wouldn't it be great if when we got to the top it was the 15th century again?", and I could just see Harry's eyes go round as saucers at the thought...
We had a quick cream tea (scones and tea) before hitting the road again, dropped Percy off back at his mums and now the boys are watching the soccer (which seems to be all consuming over here right now-- some kind of tournament that I'm sure is occupying dad just as much in Australia!) Resting on the bed now recovering as I have actually been quite sick the last couple of days and these things leave me a bit exhausted. Not sure why your posts aren't working on the blog, just leave them under the Facebook link of send us an email! Hope you all are well, will probably post again on my birthday after we get back from Scotland!
