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A country outing
Sep. 26th, 2004 08:35 pmJust back from my aunt's 90th birthday party at Leeds Castle, which confusingly is in Kent; http://www.leeds-castle.com/ if you want to see what the place is like, it's quite interesting. I went with my sister, her husband, and their son in a rental car (his is in for repairs) which I can only describe as awful - automatic, incredibly slow acceleration, and dire suspension, which didn't do my bad back much good.
Food okay (soup, meat and 2 veg, "vegetarian" alternative is salmon so wouldn't appeal to strict veggies) and the castle looked pretty interesting but we didn't have time to take the tour because we were going on somewhere else for cake and champagne. Trouble is that everyone there, with the exception of my sister and her husband and a couple of kids, was of her generation, and mostly relatives and friends from my aunt's side of the family so nobody I really know. But it was a nice day for a drive in the country, and on the whole the day went well apart from long traffic delays on the way back, which we could have probably avoided if my bro-in-law hadn't insisted on taking "short cuts" to try to get round the traffic queues, which I suspect made things worse.
Verdict - a nice day out, nice to see my aunt again after several years, and an interesting place to visit some day when I've more time, but next time I take the motorbike!
Food okay (soup, meat and 2 veg, "vegetarian" alternative is salmon so wouldn't appeal to strict veggies) and the castle looked pretty interesting but we didn't have time to take the tour because we were going on somewhere else for cake and champagne. Trouble is that everyone there, with the exception of my sister and her husband and a couple of kids, was of her generation, and mostly relatives and friends from my aunt's side of the family so nobody I really know. But it was a nice day for a drive in the country, and on the whole the day went well apart from long traffic delays on the way back, which we could have probably avoided if my bro-in-law hadn't insisted on taking "short cuts" to try to get round the traffic queues, which I suspect made things worse.
Verdict - a nice day out, nice to see my aunt again after several years, and an interesting place to visit some day when I've more time, but next time I take the motorbike!
