Last of the Summer Wine (& wasps)

Unfortunately the dinner menu for Steve B & Jan was unsuccessful; despite all Phil’s careful planning and preparation all didn’t go to plan which was a shame because he’d worked so hard. Phil’s starter of stuffed sliced avocado stuffed with avocado, blue cheese and slices of garlic with a side extra of lightly fried prawns didn’t taste that great. The prawns were okay because you can’t really go wrong with them but the combination of the avocado and blue cheese didn’t really work. His main course of ‘beef on croute’ a fillet of beet stuffed with pate and mustard and coated with mustard and puff pastry should have been fabulous but unfortunately the joint of meat was so massive that it came out pink and hadn’t quite cooked through.
Poor Phil ended up stripping off the tasty coating and pan frying the fillet; it was tender and tasted great but lacked the ‘wow’ factor because he’d had to strip away all the flavouring stuff. Worst luck for Phil that he’d picked the most expensive chocolate for the dessert which ended up making his homemade chocolate mousse really rich and almost too rich to eat. Never mind, the wine flowed, we had cheese and biscuits and port to fill all the holes. Steve B and Jan were uncomplaining and were the most perfect guests and at best went home merry if not a little hungry.

On Sunday morning, I woke up with bleary sticky mascara stuck eyes because I was too drunk to take my makeup off and knew without a doubt that we’d be having a ‘duvet day’. Luckily a tired jaded Phil felt in the same mode so at least we were in zinc. Phil did drag me out of bed at 10 o’clock to walk to the shops for the papers; I was reluctant but agreed to follow. We got back, read the Sunday papers then settled down with a beer to watch the Gran d Prix. After it finished we stuffed our faces with steak pie and left over potatoes and vegetables from the night previous night. Later on Phil fell asleep, I stuffed my face with chocolate flakes and we ended up having a fairly early night.

Today, we did at least make it to the health club. Phil wanted a walk to The Giffard but instead we decided to drive out to the country and discover an undiscovered food and watering hole. Our final destination was the Black Horse at Woburn which turned out, not to be the best of choices. The food and wine were expensive and it was haunted by drunken wasps. I spent most of my time hiding in the toilet or running in to the servant’s quarters, not the best dining experience for Phil or me. A pretentious diner, full of snobs and we certainly won’t be returning. Worst of all, thirty quid later, one drink and one course and we came out hungry. Crap and thank goodness we could feast on leftover cheese and biscuits when we got back home.

Other than that, you can tell life has been dull. In total we have had 4 viewings on the NH house, not bad going but we hope for much, much more. The down side about having your house on the market is that you have to be anally tidy 24/7; I am tidy and clean 23/7 but it does turn into an obsession. Flowers carefully set on the dining table, coffee brewing in the kitchen, dishwasher going full spin washing the dishes and the electronic air freshener belting fall blast in the hallway; not to mention the right papers lying in the paper rack as well as bread baking in the new bread maker machine. It’s all hard work but hopefully it wall pay off in the end.

Today spells the official end of the summer. What summer I ask you?? Never mind, I look forward to the dying off of the wasps and to the onset of the autumn, which is always my favourite season. A new season, a new life and hopefully a new house sale – bring it on is what I say. Lets got on with next chapter of our lives.

Catchup !

It’s always a pain when I don’t do a blog for a few days as my senile mind tends to forget what I’ve done. But here I am so I’ll have a go at filling in the last few days. Tina Derry came out on Wednesday to do the HIP survey which I think stands for ‘House Information Survey’ but I’m not too sure. Tina and her husband have done quite a few house renovations so we always have quite a bit to talk about when we meet up with her. Anyway, she did her job and I don’t think she had any major concerns but not 100% certain because we haven’t received a copy of the full report. I seem to remember that it was a fairly miserable afternoon on Wednesday? Early evening I met up with Christine at The Odeon to see ‘The Time Travellers Wife’; it was a pleasant enough film but didn’t bear much resemblance to the book. While I was out, Jim picked up Phil (again) and they went to meet up with George, Alfie and Chris.

Phil spent all of Thursday morning watching travel DVD’s on his laptop and refused to come to the gym with me. He had a couple of interruptions, one was a call from the agent asking for us to install a digital aerial at the OB flat so the tenants can pick up Freeview channels, which is fair enough. We knew we should have had this done before we went away but ever frugal, we thought we’d try and save ourselves some pennies. As is always the case, if you try to cut corners with rentals it always come back to bite you on the bum. The second interruption was a phone call from Georgina to say that she got all ‘A*s’ in her GSCEs all bar PE which she got an ‘A’ in. You can’t get better results than this, so well done to her. Phil did stop watching DVD’s in the afternoon and went food shopping, I can’t remember what I did. We had a viewing on the house accompanied by the agent at 5pm. Two lovely charming ladies who said lots of nice things but we have yet to receive feedback. Other than that, the evening was uneventful – the usual, TV, wine and early to bed. Boring.

On Friday morning I went back to the chiropractor for some more manipulation. Gabrielle says I’m still very stiff so will need a few more treatments. My back is slightly easier so she must be doing something right. Phil went to Northampton to pick up Georgina and they went to see a film at the cinema. After David Lloyd and a quick snack from the market I drove to the OU to meet up with Jan for a walk. Just as Janet put on her walking shoes and got out umbrellas from the boot of her car, the heavens opened and it pissed it down. Then a wasp started to attack me under my umbrella so we decided to abandon the walk and jumped in J’s car and headed for shelter at The Plough in Simpson. There was a rowdy crowd at the bar when we first arrived but luckily they disappeared into the back restaurant and we were able to have a drink and a catch up. We were going to stay for a second drink but then I suddenly remembered I had to be at Oldbrook to pick up Harriet at half past one. Luckily I remembered in the nick of time.

Poor Harriet’s car failed its MOT big time and will be in the garage until after the bank holiday. She’d asked me to pick her up and take her to her dad’s to pick up some duty free fags that he’d brought her. Whilst we were there Chris asked me to type up an invoice for him. Cheeky but I didn’t mind much really. It never ceases to amaze me that in spite of having a top of the range computer and teaching for the last 40 years, Chris doesn’t understand the concept of windows. Anyway after we’d drafted up the invoice, I dropped HH back at the OB flat and headed for home. It was gone 3 by this time and when I checked my ‘to do’ list I saw that I’d tasked myself to paint the bathroom ceiling. To be honest, I didn’t feel luck it much as the air had turned really humid but still I got on my painting clothes and got stuck in. It didn’t really need doing but it didn’t take long to paint and looked much better when I was finished. After I’d put the paints away I gave the bathroom a really good scrub and now it looks really shiny and almost new.

Phil got up at some unearthly hour this morning and we were at Kingston Tesco’s at seven thirty am. We have Steve and Jan coming for dinner this evening so Phil needed to get some fresh ingredients. Phil got cooking some of his recipes when we got home; I cleaned up after him and we just managed to get out of the house before the agent turned up for the first house viewing at 11.00am. Normally we like to be around to suss out any potential buyer but we think its better to get at least one of the cars out of the way to ease the parking congestion which has the potential to put off buyers. We went to Kiln Farm to pick up the PO Box post and went to David Lloyd for a work out. We spotted the second viewer of the day with the agent as we pulled into the cul-de-sac but there was nowhere to park so we quickly reversed and drove from the block. Phil watched the qualifying but the chef spent the rest of the afternoon cooking in the kitchen. More about his menu and our evening later; for now I need to clean up the kitchen and then try and make myself presentable. No easy feat these days.

Life, Death & Shingle

Michael from Harpers Landscaping came along on Monday morning accompanied by his girlfriend’s 14 year old brother who was helping him in his summer holidays. A lorry arrived shortly after with 4 massive bags of stones. Some 5 hours later, Michael and his helper had laid down the membrane in the front and back and between the pair of them they had shoveled all the stones over the black plastic. Me and Phil watched how they did it, it was straight forward bar the manual labour and when we get our next house project we shall do it ourselves.

Shingle is not to everyone’s taste but this has been a ‘quick fix’ to tidy things up and has done the job nicely. We have left a considerable area of grass to the left of the patio so any perspective buyer can do what they wish with this bit. I was loading my car outside Pip’s house and he came out for a chat. He said that he could see we were having stones laid (nosey or what) but he also made a comment that he thought that we ought to get the conifers lopped as they were close to John’s house. John is the neighbour that keeps putting nasty notes on our cars so I’m not inclined to get the trees snipped but the conifers are a bit over-powering so I may give in and get out Will Tricks, the tree surgeon. This is a well kept, tidy little cul-de-sac but the neighbours' are seriously weird!

Phil chose to go to the Thai Modern restaurant in the city centre for his birthday meal. Unfortunately I didn’t have the hindsight to book a table in advance and when we got there we’d already sat down and ordered a drink before being told that the usual ‘eat-all-you-can’ buffet was not on the menu. This was a shame because if we’d have known we would have gone for the 2 course lunch restaurant near Westcroft. Never mind we still enjoyed a very tasty Thai green curry and very nice it was too.

Although it was his birthday, Phil wasn’t much in the mood for a party so we lounged on the sofas and caught up with some episodes of ‘Homes under the Hammer’. Late afternoon I remembered I had brought a tub of cement to lay in the gaps on the patio so I shoveled this in the holes and swept off the surplus. Harriet popped round after work to drop off a card and a present for Phil and Steve Pem also dropped by with a card. We hadn’t seen him or Mads for ages so it was an opportunity to catch up with ‘Pemberton’ news.

Yesterday morning saw me up at 5.00 am and Phil came downstairs just after 6am. He is meant to be finishing off his TMA but instead he spent ages on the internet planning an around the world trip. Phil is getting very excited but I am slightly apprehensive as we have many things to consider before we can just fly away. I also worry about the money aspect; with no income aside from the rental and a hefty lump going out for school fees, we are spending our savings like water. I worry that we won't have much left for when we fully retire but then I reason that with the amount that we drink, its very unlikely we'll live to an old age so we may as well spend it now, you can't take it with you after all.

I have learnt with Phil, that rather than object to his latest plan, its better to listen without objection and generally the idea goes away nearly as soon as it came. If I start arguing in the very first instance, this makes him more determined! I’m not sure if my strategy has worked with his latest plan, and god only knows what country or continent I shall find myself in this winter!

We had a good clean and tidy up ready for the agent to come and carry out a valuation on Jim and Shirley’s house. We’d already discussed what we thought to be a fair price and turns out that the agent agreed. We are trying out Carters because we have used these before in the past and they have been the most helpful in Phil’s latest property hunts. The guy that came round said he recognized our style from the kebab flat which he came out to value. I’m not sure this is such a good thing because our rental agent said the same thing about the OB flat when he came out to value. I emailed the girl we use to carry out the HIP report and it’s a good thing I did because she is £65 cheaper than the agent’s valuation. Just shows you’ve got to shop around. Anyway the agent came back out after lunch to take the photographs and the ball now is well and truly rolling. Rock and roll! Fingers crossed for a good offer with no chain.

Yesterday afternoon I went for my appointment with Gabrielle, the chiropractor that I used a few years ago. Phil said I was cheeky because on the phone I asked to be let off the consultation fee of 50 quid and just pay for the treatment of £35.00. The receptionist said she would check and phoned back to yes that was fine. Okay I may have played the poverty line a bit, but hey, if you don’t ask, you don’t get! My luck was in and she able to see me almost straight away. Gabrielle examined me and said that I had tightness in the lumbar area; apparently this area is connected to the adrenal gland and is an indication of stress! I told Phil I was stressed but he didn’t believe me. Living with Phil is one big stress!! Anyway she did a number of maneuvers and I did feel much looser when I got off the couch. I am going back on Friday and I’m hoping that a handful of sessions will cure me completely.

This morning we’re off to the gym, this will be the first time in months that Phil has been so I can imagine it’s going to be painful for him. Later Phil needs to go food shopping and also he needs to cook a chicken casserole with rice for our lunch. We are also having the HIP inspection today, so there is much to do on this very miserable wet Wednesday.

House swap Australia

The trouble with Birthdays when you get a bit older is that you are getting closer and closer to death and disablement with every new one. Not a very positive start but hopefully it should get lighter as we get going. Claire and I don’t normally get each other a birthday or Christmas present for each other, preferring to take a holiday together. For the first time, I bought myself a birthday present on Monday; I subscribed to a website that deals with exchanging homes for a holiday around the world. It wasn’t expensive at about £16 for 3 months registration and I have yet to find out if it rolls over and almost impossible to get out of without deleting your credit card. There are lots of them but the website that I used is http://www.homexchangevacation.com/ . You can choose any destination around the world to swap with. You can register free and view everywhere you like but you can’t contact anyone until you pay for full registration.

It’s quite exciting looking at all the properties that are trying to do the same. You can make the search easier by entering dates and more details to narrow down the results. Once registered I emailed about 20 people that wanted to swap for a property in England. I had 3 come back when I read my emails this morning, 2 saying thanks but no thanks and one that is very interested in swapping between December 2009 and February 2010. They live in Queensland at a place called Townsville right by the coast and the Great Barrier Reef in a 5 bedroom 3 bathroom executive house with its own grounds and massive pool. Wow, they will be disappointed if they swap with us, especially over winter. They also want to swap cars as they have 2 for us to choose from a 2004 Mercedes and a 2006 Subaru Liberty GT wagon (whatever one of those is). I hope they like Claire’s KA.

I have already started to look at flights and it’s looking like at least £600 return so it might be worth getting a “round the world” ticket with 6 or 7 stop over’s for a few hundred pounds more. I’m so excited but Claire says she feels stressed. How can a round the world holiday with 3 months in Australia make you stressed? I couldn’t think of anything more un-stressing. Anyway, we are getting no younger and it makes sense to take some time out to enjoy yourselves while you can sometimes. We all work hard enough, so we can all play hard as well.

We have just had Carters Estate Agents around to value Jim and Shirley’s house. Strangely his estimation was the same as we had already discussed with Jim, and he thinks it should sell quite easily as there are more people looking than selling at the moment. It is perfectly suited to a young family and he thinks that it would appeal to a young family so that’s good. He is coming back this afternoon to take some photos. I said that the owner has agreed to replace the wall between the two bedrooms if the purchaser wanted. Hope that’s ok Jim?

Happy Birthday to Phil!

Just a few things to blog about today but first up, I must say ‘Happy Birthday’ to Phil. He is 54 young today and as I tell him, “you’re only as old as the woman you feel”!!! He’s still asleep in bed at the moment and I’m dying to wake him up and make him open his pressies but I don’t think this is fair on his special day so I’ve come downstairs to resist the temptation to poke him into the land of the living.

I enjoyed our mini trip away but I am pleased to report that we won’t be putting any offers in on the properties we viewed. Margate didn’t really do it for me, I thought it was very much a has been town, full of weary looking B&B’s, boarded up houses and fish and chip shops. Both Phil and I liked Broadstairs but the traffic in the summer months would drive me bonkers. We wrote off Ramsgate as soon as we drove in but to be fair we didn’t venture down to the harbour so perhaps we didn’t see it at is full potential. I glad we went and we a scout round but my gut feeling is that you’ve got to stick to the areas that you know. The journey down and back was a complete nightmare, 4 hours with Phil huffing and puffing and swearing every 30 seconds is not a nice experience.

We’ve had a very lazy weekend, Grand Prix weekends always are very chilled ones for us. Phil watched the qualifying on Saturday and afterwards Harriet and Shane came and picked us up and we went to The Giffard for a very late afternoon lunch. It was quiet and there were not very many wasps to pester us and we had a pleasant enough meal. The plan was that we were going to walk home but Phil was feeling very tired because he hadn’t slept so well the night before so Harriet gave us a lift back home. Saturday night was spent in front of the telly watching the X-Factor. How exciting are we?

Unfortunately for me I woke up in absolute agony yesterday morning with my back. It has been playing me up for the last 6 weeks but I woke up in the early hours and was so uncomfortable I had to get the spare duvet and go and sleep on the sofa so as not to disturb Phil. It was a nightmare - I could hardly get down the stairs. Later in the morning I got dressed and got in the car having decided to try and do a little exercise at the gym to try and loosen up my back. However, I got out of the drive and the pain was so bad when I changed gear that I had to give up and come home. Phil had arranged a viewing on a one bed flat in Downs Barn at 11.45am but before that we drove to Boots on Bradwell Common to get me some painkillers. Phil made us a chilli for lunch and we spent the afternoon watching the Grand Prix. I did the ironing whilst watching it because it was less painful standing up than sitting down. After the Grand Prix Harriet popped round, I think she was bored and had nowhere else to go. She was just about to leave when she had a call from Shane to say that he had locked himself out and so had the tenants next door. It was just as well she was here really because I was able to give her spare keys for both houses.

The phone call from the agent on Saturday took me by surprise and I was taken aback to hear that our tenant was going to vacate at the end of September. It didn’t surprise Phil because he had laid awake one night thinking about this and had come to the conclusion that our tenant would leave. It’s funny really, 9 months in the kebab flat and I was dying to return home but we’re fairly comfortable in the NH house and it’s just as comfortable as home. In a way it has scuppered our plans but everything happens for a reason and we are hoping to secure a sale on the Jim & Shirley’s house quite quickly and will need somewhere to live. We have much to organise. After taking it easy for the last 2 months it is time to get going again. Thankfully my back is much easier today; not sure it’s down to all the pills I swallowed yesterday or taking it easy, I dunno but I’ve got so much to do this week that I can’t afford to be disabled. Must go and get this published, I have got Michael the landscape gardener coming to lay a membrane and cover it with shingle in the front garden and by the patio in the back. Time now for this Sheila to go and wake up the birthday boy and see if we can find a house exchange in Australia!

Bang goes Bangkok Sheila

Although we have been really trying to find a rundown property to develop in both Milton Keynes and elsewhere we have been unsuccessful so far. We were going to put Jim and Shirley’s house on the market at the end of the summer holidays as that’s when the markets normally pick up but having talked about it in Kent we agreed to set the ball rolling next week as there are so few on the market at the moment. Normally the market is flat over the summer holidays as we found out last year being unable to sell the Two Mile Ash flat and having to let it out again. Whilst away in Kent I took loads of books and DVD’s about Thailand, Vietnam and the areas around so we could plan this year’s winter break. Bangkok seemed the ideal starting point as I found a return fare for £275 which is amazing. From Bangkok it is easy to fly anywhere else in that area so would be an easy base to visit the other surrounding countries from. The more I looked at the books the more excited I was getting but also realized that Laos and Cambodia wouldn’t suit us as much as Vietnam and Thailand. We had almost decided to tour around the whole coast of Vietnam on a motor bike which would have been a real adventure. The other spot that would be easy to get to is the Andaman Islands, little known from England but well visited from India; I would love to go there as well if time permitted.

While we were away we had a phone call from our agent about our Giffard Park house as it is up for rental renewal in October. The tenant wanted us to drop the price, quoting several other properties that looked better than ours which were cheaper than ours. I told the agent that he spent a long time trying to get us to drop the price before he moved in and we weren’t dropping it now either. If he had seen better properties cheaper than ours why was he trying to negotiate with us? We would love to move back into our lovely renovated house again anyway. Having slept on it one night that I didn’t sleep too well, I said to Claire that I thought he wouldn’t renew the contract because he doesn’t like not getting his own way. The agent thought that he would still stay regardless but I just had a feeling, I have met him several times in the last year. The phone call came from Morgan’s last night that he will be moving out at the end of September. A bit of a shame that he didn’t keep it for another 6 months as it would have given us a chance to buy and renovate at least one more flat before looking for work again but never mind. The other thing it will screw up is our holiday to Bangkok.

We can’t really justify leaving such a big house empty for several months at a time. Maybe our option might now be a house exchange in Australia. How would you feel about that Sheila?

Canterbury tales

Mini holiday over and we set off home via Canterbury after breakfast. Neither of us had ever been to Canterbury before so we were looking forward to it. Although not very far from Margate it feels a million miles away with all the posh shops, book shops and ancient architecture. Judging from the local paper, the house prices seem to have at least doubled by this short drive and it’s not even by the coast.

We found the entrance to Canterbury cathedral, I got Claire to stand in front and a mail van pulls up right outside making the shot. It was difficult to even get a shot of the inside without paying the £7.50 entrance fee as nobody wanted to move out the way or pay the fee. We walked around for a while and both forgot that we were going to look for the restaurant owned by that Michelin chef with only one arm called Michael Caines. Well he has the right name anyway. If we had remembered to look for it or stumbled across it we would have had to find the car and put more money in first. The parking and traffic in this area is ridiculous and you spend most of your time driving in heavy traffic looking for a parking spot and most of your money paying for it when you do find one. I think we are spoilt for parking in Milton Keynes.

It started raining after we had got ourselves disorientated and lost trying to find our way back to the car. We jumped into one of those expensive departmental stores where I had to pay 50 pence to go to the toilet. Seems to have been hit by inflation even more than house prices to spend a penny; should have put my money into toilets and parking rather than property. Anyway we managed to find the car 2 minutes before our ticket ran out and headed home.

We had an awful journey home with the usual Friday afternoon problems on the M25. While I stopped for fuel we decided to stay off the M25 and find an alternative as the last 10 miles would have taken us longer than a detour. It’s easy to do that these days because of satnav’s; trouble is everyone has one and does the same making the surrounding areas just as congested. We talked about stopping for lunch at St Albums but, as it was Friday, decided to get up the M1 home before the traffic got even worse.

We were starving by the time we eventually got back and stopped off at the Indian next to Waitrose called “Shiraz” that are advertising a three course lunch for £8. It turned out not to be an Indian at all but Persian so don’t be fooled by the front, it doesn’t say Persian. Not really our cup of tea, chicken and prunes, lamb and lentils and they had very strange starters of Greek dishes. Quite disappointing really, so we won’t be going back there again in a hurry. The food is neither spicy or tasty to my pallet and reminded both of us of our trip around the Emirates where we spent 3 weeks over Christmas and New Year driving looking for sensible priced hotels.

Sorry to end on a downer but that’s the way it goes sometimes. Looks like we will have to intensify our search for a property in Milton Keynes. Never mind it’s a Grand Prix weekend but a real shame that Michael decided not to come back, come on Lewis!

Kent property search

We had 3 property viewings organized with Ward and Partners that seem to be the up and coming agents in this area at the moment. When I first rang Ross from Ward he had the 3 viewings arranged within the 3 or 4 minutes it took to register with them; probably the most efficient I have ever experienced. It’s a shame that the others weren’t of his calibre. This awful block is right outside our hotel and we have to look at it every time we come in and out; you just have to look at the sea view and try and ignore it but it is difficult as it is quite imposing. We tried quite hard to view in areas we like and it is very important to Claire that she likes the outside and has a good feel about the area it is in. As we weren’t viewing until 2pm we headed off in our own tour to see the areas that we like the look of.

We started off by driving around Clifton where we had a couple of viewings that is attached to Margate. Not really much different to Margate except a little newer which I’m not sure if is a good or bad thing. Then we were off to Broardstairs where I had camped with an old girlfriend when I was 18 and remembered as the best place in the area. But we couldn’t park easily and ended up driving to Ramsgate first. Same trouble with parking but we persevered and found the sea front where there was ample of free parking. Ramsgate seemed better that I had remembered, especially around the sea front area and surrounding front houses and town but it does get worse the further out you go. Claire spotted a big ferry coming into the harbour where there is a lift down to the sea front, but unfortunately it only runs at weekends.

Back to Broadstairs where we managed to park quite near the sea front and Bleak house where Dickens lived or something, can’t quite remember. Broadstairs, to us, still seems the best place in the area along the coast. Lovely beach and restaurants along the coast, but more Italian than I would prefer. It’s strange, but I think that Italian restaurants are quite posy and make a good area but are not really my taste to eat regularly. We stopped off at the Albion Hotel for lunch where Claire has a smoked haddock and broccoli tartlet and I tried the mackerel pate with French bread. We both had the pork and apple in mustard cream sauce with mash. Best meal so far and all for less than a tenner.
It was then a quick dash back to start our viewings where we got there a little early so we could get a feel for the area. The sea was only down the road but unfortunately you couldn’t see the sea unless you hung right out of the window. A massive property with 5 bedrooms, a very large kitchen breakfast room, two large reception rooms, a toilet downstairs, bathroom wit toilet and separate toilet upstairs, a cellar with two rooms. Incredible really for £130000, especially as all 5 bedrooms had a sink fitted and all but one were large enough to support an en-suite. When I first took the phone call Ross was very efficient but unfortunately he had a couple of days leave and Nicky showed us around. Not saying she wasn’t any good, we both liked her, but she wasn’t from the area and wasn’t much use for advice as she had to use her satnav between properties. This first house seemed to have been used for some type of homeless hostel and has quite a bad feeling about it. We were just about to move onto the second when there was a knock at the door. Two fat ladies were there to view at the same time as us and were told that they could come around the others with us. Nicky had no idea and phoned to confirm. It was all becoming a bit of a circus.

We eventually went on to the second property which was a reposition and on first impressions was much worse. The street was a dead end with crap houses around and broken walls and rubbish everywhere. The first room we looked in still had a double bed in with the wallpaper peeling off the wall and all over this bed. A serious damp problem and the electric was turned off so some rooms were quite dark, especially with the metal shields over every window and door to stop the squatters getting in. It reminded me of being back in the kebab flat. This property was even bigger than the first and I counted beds in 10 rooms. It was described as having 5 bedrooms and 5 reception rooms but there must have been another room because there was also a lounge with a kitchen from it. The first room where the damp was is directly below the shower and I guess it would be quite easy to solve the damp problem by refitting another properly. On closer inspection, most the ceilings and walls seemed to have been recently re-plastered and decorated but all the rubbish and dirty beds made it seem awful. I don’t think this place is as bad as it looks. If you changed one room into two bathrooms you would still have 9 rooms that you could let out and 3 bathrooms for people to use which is much more practical than 10 bedrooms with one bathroom. No wonder there is leaks into the room below; it must get as much use as the David Lloyds showers.

The third property was in a much better area but further from the sea and was so small compared to the others having only 2 bedrooms but was almost finished. The kitchen had been refitted and the walls tiled but not grouted, most walls and ceilings had been re-plastered but not painted. There was even a newly fitted double glazed conservatory fitted on the back. It wouldn’t take much time to sort this one out. On the down side, it seemed so small compared to the first two and a similar price. If we liked Margate more, my money would be on the second one but I don’t think Claire would agree. Really, none of today’s viewings were suitable for us but I could see someone making money on all of them. Maybe we would buy here if we came back and viewed in the Broadstairs area but the parking and traffic is a nightmare.

We returned home via Tesco’s to get some more wine for another night by the tv with more cuddles. We did pop out for a quick drink at Wetherspoons (The Mechanical Elephant) where Claire had the Thursday special of premier chicken tika massala and a glass of wine for less than £6 and I settled for a pint and Claire’s popedams with the mango chutney that she doesn’t like. Wow, I’m going to get thin. We walked back by the beach which was almost empty by then and Claire couldn’t resist looking for one of those chunky lifeguards, but unfortunately, there was only one, very cool looking one around.

The Great British Summer

Normally when we come to this part of the world (Dover when going to France), on a good day, it will take about two hours. As there was an accident between junctions 4 and 6 of the M2 and we could see that the traffic was stationary we were forced to get off and reset the satnav to avoid the M2. This worked fine until we came to a graunching halt and were stuck in a jam for well over an hour. I turned off into an estate trying to find an alternative route without success and ended up joining the same queue at the same place we left. Claire had heard on the radio that the accident had been cleared so we headed back towards the M2 again with the traffic going the other way solid right to the motorway now. The cars were still stationary so we headed back towards London on the M2. Desperate measures but there seemed no alternative. We got off at the next junction and found our way to the M20 towards Dover. We eventually arrived at our hotel in Margate after over 4 hours in the baking sun. It had to be the hottest day of the year so far; maybe the only sunny day we have seen since we got back from Turkey.

We had booked the Premier Inn for a change, mainly because it has parking and we guesses that at this time of year there would be lots of people here. The room it fine but not luxury and we do have a sea view from out bedroom so that’s great. We had intended to drive to one of the estate agents that I had registered with as we couldn’t check in until 2pm but with the delays we didn’t arrive until then so missed the agent out. We dumped our bags and headed off into town. It was a baking hot day and we could see the reasons why everyone was talking about revamping this town. However, the beach was full up; the last time I saw that many people on the beach was in Benidorm.

We stopped for a refreshing drink or two before finding a cafe for some local fish and chips. While we were waiting the delivery lorry stopped outside while they loaded all the boxes of frozen fish from Russia. Haven’t we any fish left in our sea's?

We got a few bottles of wine and settled in for a night of tv and cuddles. Thursday we have 3 properties to view and have found another 4 that we would also like to see and I will report back tomorrow. Joy; it's raining. That's the end of the great British summer.