Power boat racing but no Park Run.

Saturday 18 June.

 

I was planning to do the Park Run at the esplanade this morning. The weather was beautiful and ideal for running. Moira checked the start time on the internet; it was 9:30 am and it said it would be run with the Scottish Power Boat Championships going on in the background. This competition was taking part today and tomorrow. The only problem was that there wasn't any parking allowed on the esplanade so we planned to leave early and park some distance away and walk the rest. It was 8:00 am when I got up to make the breakfast after watching 'Newswatch' on the TV. This is the programme where they answer viewer's comments and criticism concerning the BBC News. The only problem is that in all time I've watched it I have never witnessed anyone from the BBC holding up their hands and saying that they got it wrong.

 

We left at 8:45 am to get there in plenty of time to walk to the start. Moira drove and parked at a side street off Clarence St. It was just behind the new Aldi supermarket. We walked the five minutes it took to the esplanade. There were 'no parking' cones set up all along the streets and when we reached the esplanade there were stewards and security people in reflective jackets everywhere. The surprise now was that there was nobody about warming up for the run, we were early but not by that much. Further along there wasn't anyone setting up the start either. I asked one of the security people but she didn't have a clue. It looked as if the run had been cancelled due to the event on the river and lack of convenient parking. I decided to run anyway while Moira walked along the front.

 

I was breathless at first and it took me a bit to get into a steady pace. Instead of turning at the boat club and doing the Park Run route I continued to the main road and ran to the the Battery Park where I turned back. I met Moira on the way back just after the boat club. She turned then and I ran all the way back to the Pier Head end where I turned again. I ran until I met Moira walking back where I joined her to walk. I hadn't bothered timing my run but estimated that I had run about 6 km. From the light at the middle of the esplanade to the boat club they had set up stalls and tents, there was an old bus that was a bar, a couple of grandstands had been set up and pop music was blaring out from loudspeakers erected all along the railings at the front. This is going on outside the houses where there had been a complaint last year because someone had dared to paint their house yellow. I wondered how they felt about all this noise and activity that was going at their front doors. Also I would imagine that all the stalls, bars and eateries are being done by out of town concerns while the shops in town would be deserted with all the people coming to watch the racing. Also Moira had spoken to one of the stewards and they weren't local, they were 'zero hour contract' people and had only got a phone call yesterday to turn up for their duties at the event. The other thing that was peculiar was the parking restrictions, we couldn't work out where people were supposed to park, especially if they were from out of town and didn't know the area.

 

As we walked back the power boats were making their way past the Pier Head to the start near the boat club. They had come from the James Watt Dock where they were kept overnight. The racing wasn't beginning until 10:00 am so they could have managed to have the Park Run. We were going to come later to watch but changed our minds when one of the stewards told us they expected 20,000 people today. If that was the case it would be packed and difficult to move. Moira went into Aldi when we reached the car and bought some bedding plants for the garden. After that I drove home. The car, Hyundai i10, in my opinion is much better that the bigger engined i20 that we have in SA.

 

When we got home I intended to do some gardening but was a bit tired after my run so left it until after lunch. I spent the rest of the morning reading the newspaper and managed to complete the 'Telegraph' prize crossword and submit it. When we got into the garden later I started weeding at the top of the garden, it was quite overgrown but the rhubarb that was covering over half the plot was keeping a lot of the weeds at bay. While I did that Moira planted the plants she got at Aldi in the pots and containers that we have distributed about the gravel.

After

Before

After.

Before

 

When we finished we came in and sat in the conservatory reading. The weather was glorious now and very warm. After an hour I had to move into the lounge where it was cooler to continue with my book. After dinner the TV wasn't very good and nothing we wanted to watch. Instead I downloaded a photo editing programme app and worked on a couple of pictures and managed to doctor them up to look quite good.

 

I was feeling a bit choked up and my nose raw. Moira thought it was from working in the garden and the pollen, she gave me an antihistamine pill before I went to bed. Also my left ear seems to be blocked with wax again and Moira put drops of almond oil it it to loosen the wax. I went to bed early and the antihistamine helped me sleep soundly all night.

 

 

 

 

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Lovely weather over the Clyde.

Friday 17 June.

 

The news on the TV was mainly about a MP and Remain campaigner, Jo Cox, who was shot and killed in her constituency. It was by a right wing nutter shouting 'Britain First' while shooting and stabbing her. This is the consequence of this EU Referendum where Nationalists like UKIP lend credence to these loonies and it brings them out of the woodwork.

 

After breakfast today we went out for a walk. I let Moira lead, not wanting to make changes in her route as I usually do. She wanted to walk at her pace and check out her other hip which was now giving her problems. She took a pain killer before we started and she was all right. We walked along the cycle path to Barr's Brae and down to the town. We headed from the town centre to Clune Brae and up the hill home. It was a good walk and Moira felt the benefit of it. The weather was very nice and clear, giving us outstanding views of the Firth as we made our way down into town.

Greenock, the Clyde and the Gareloch.

The River Clyde with Ben Lomond behind.

 

It had been lovely for the walk and when we got back I took further advantage of it and trimmed the back hedge between us and Hugh. The hedge had grown quite a bit and there was a lot to cut off, it filled the garden rubbish bin. When we came in Margaret called on FaceTime, both boys were up and about though Rhys still isn't speaking. Ewan was in tears by the end of the call, he wanted to come up to Scotland for a holiday with us and Hollie.

 

In the afternoon we relaxed and sat out in the conservatory and read. I am getting into my Peter James book, it is all right but all his plots seem to be much the same. In the evening we watched the TV though there wasn't much different on and I got back to my book again for an hour before getting to bed.

 

 

 

 

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Poor Wales, lucky England.

Thursday 16 June.

 

It was another day without a lot of activity. The weather wasn't very good again with showers most of the day. The forecast for tomorrow is lot more promising and hopefully we can get some more gardening done.

 

After breakfast I went into the external hard drive we have looking for a file with the list of marathons and ultra marathons I have run over the years. I found it and transferred it on to the laptop. Then after a lot of hassle eventually managed to get it on to the Google cloud and from there transferee it to the iPad. While I was doing that Moira emptied one or two of the boxes we had shipped over from SA. It was the ones with the books in them and also my diaries. I checked on the list of marathons and for the years that were missing I found the relevant diaries and inserted the results for these years. There are still a couple of years where I couldn't find the diaries and I don't know where they could be. I added up the number of races I have listed and it is about 135. With the years that are missing I estimated that the final total would be over 150. This took most of the day, on and off, to do.

 

We got in touch with Hector and Fiona on FaceTime. They have family coming to stay over the next week or two so it will be a while before we get through to see them. I phoned David on Skype and arranged to see him next week.

 

In the afternoon there was the football match between England and Wales in the Euro 2016 Cup. There wasn't any score and about 10 minutes before half time there was a knock at the door. It was a guy wanted to sell me replacement windows at a discount, I eventually told him I wasn't interested and was watching the football. I got rid of him just in time, Wales had a free kick 35 yards out and Bale scored from it. From that distance the keeper should have saved it easily but made a hash of it. In the second half Hodgson made two substitutions, one was Vardy who scored from an offside position and got away with it because a Wales defender touched it with his head first. Wales looked like they were going to hang on for a draw but Sturridge the other England sub score in injury time with one minute to go. The commentators now praised Hodgson for his tactical brilliance with his half time changes, he was just lucky! England were the better team but its still annoying when they win.

 

In the evening I was going to watch 'Springwatch' but Moira said there was a couple of episodes in the 'One Foot in the Grave' comedy series with Richard Wilson. They were quite old now but still good. It was bed time when it finished.

 

 

 

 

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Easy day.

Wednesday 15 June.

 

We didn't do much today. After breakfast I had half an hour pulling weeds again in one of the borders in the back garden. It began to rain and it was on and off all day, mostly on.

 

Moira went out mid-morning to do the shopping and stock up with food. I stayed on and read my book until Jeremy Vine came on the radio at mid-day. In the afternoon Moira continued taking stuff in from the 'van to the house. I later came out to the 'van and we repaired the fridge door that was loose at the top hinge. Something had broken where the spindle slotted in and I filled the gap with rawl plug. This did the trick and the door was closing properly again.

 

I read my book again when we came in, until dinner time and the early evening TV. Later there was three episodes of 'New Tricks' on the Drama channel. We watched two of them and I recorded the third for later then got to bed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Tidying the garden.

Tuesday 14 June.

 

Moira was up first this morning and made the early cuppa. We had it in bed and read the paper which we downloaded. I hadn't got the TV in the bedroom set up yet and I watched the breakfast TV show on the iPad instead. After the sport's news I got up and made the breakfast.

 

After I had washed up the dishes I got into the garden for an hour and began pulling up weeds growing in the gravel and in the borders at the sides. At the same time Moira did the washing that had built up in the motorhome and hung it out, the weather was looking very nice early on but the forecast on TV said that there was to be rain later.

 

There was still a lot of stuff to get in from the 'van and we spent some time doing that. I got the laptop set up in the 'study' upstairs. After that we checked up on our bank accounts and saving but couldn't find any information on ISA's we have with Santander. We decided to go to their bank in Greenock after lunch and check on the balance for these accounts. Moira parked at Tesco's and we walked over to the bank in the mall to Santander. We found that all we had was £10 in one account, we had transferred the money last year to open the current accounts with Santander that offer good interest rates, and had forgotten about it. On the way back we went to the library in Port Glasgow and got some books to read.

 

When we got home I decided to have half an hour pulling weeds at the borders in the front garden. While I was doing that Ricky next door came out for a chat. I thanked him for cutting the hedges for me and he told me that he had also mown the lawn a couple of times. The spaces between the paving that Ricky had laid for me had weeds growing there. He said he had cleared the ones on his own side then filled in with a kind of grouting. It was called Postcrete and he said if I get a bag of it from B&Q he would grout the spaces on my side. At that point the rain that bad been forecast came on. I shouted to Moira to get her washing in and I finished off pulling more weeds before it got too heavy.

 

I started reading one of the books I got from the library. It was the next one in the Roy Grace detective series by Peter James that I've been reading called 'You Are Dead'. I stopped reading when Moira had the dinner ready and later watched the TV. After 'Mash' tonight we watched 'Springwatch' that was quite good. I was then going to read my book again but a good programme came on about immigration and the referendum. One interesting point was a statement that immigration had been encouraged to increase the work force in order to pay the pensions of the increasing number of the elderly population. I have been of the opinion for a while that the OAP is just a big Ponzi scheme where the people who are working pay the pensions of those retired. Like a Ponzi scheme when you run out of people paying in the whole enterprise collapses. When that programme finished it was time for bed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Back in Scotland.

Monday 14 June.

 

I was up before 6:00 am and instead of making just a cup of tea I made the breakfast. Moira only wakened up when I had it ready. When we were finished I took down the bed, washed up while Moira unhooked the electrics. We had everything packed away and on the road for Scotland before 7:00 am. The only problem was the weather, it was raining and sometimes very heavily.

 

The roads to the M4 motorway were all right in the direction we were going, on the other side of the road it was nose to tail, probably heading into the city. When we got on the motorway it was busier and there were hold ups where traffic was joining at the various junctions and we were slowed down a lot. When we came off at Newport it was dual carriageway to the M50 then after a few miles joined the M5. Margaret had said if we got to the Birmingham junctions before 9:00 am there would be delays. We were there about 8:30 am and the traffic was light and we had no problems other than the rain which was coming in very heavy showers.

 

We stopped for a cup of tea after Birmingham but didn't hang about but drank our tea on the run. After Birmingham it was the M6, the traffic was a bit heavier until after the M62 to Manchester and Leeds. We had a few delays with road works and busy junctions with traffic joining. Later it was easier going and the weather improved. I continued until we were in Cumbria where I stopped for lunch at a service area.

 

When we got going again it was 160 km to go. It was now very nice with the sun shining brightly, I had to have my sunglasses on. There was only one more stop, at the services at Hamilton for the loo. With the M74 now going straight to the M8 at the southern end of the Kingston Bridge it was much faster and it was only 3:30 pm so the traffic was light, not the rush hour yet. We had spent six months in South Africa, cruised to seven countries and driven through France but still one of the best sights is the drive down the M8 when you get the first view of the Clyde and the mountains of Argyll on the other side and further down the river glimpses of Ben Lomond towering over the other peaks, it was good to be back.

The Firth of Clyde.

 

It was a surprise when we arrived home to find the front of the hedges nicely trimmed; Hugh next door was out and spoke to us. I asked him about the hedges and if he had cut them but he said it was Ricky on the other side who had done it. We began to unpack some things from the 'van that we would need, mainly the food from the fridge and cupboards. When we finished it was a cup of tea and I got the TV working. There was a lot of mail to go through but Suzy had separated most of it into junk and a small amount of important stuff.

 

For dinner tonight Moira went out for fish and chips. One portion was enough for us to share between us, they are huge. Later we relaxed watching the TV. After the normal programmes there was a Dalziel and Pascoe detective mystery on the Drama channel. I think I had seen it before but wasn't sure. It was quite good. We got to bed when it finished.

 

 

 

 

 

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A braai in Wales!

Sunday 13 June.

 

I was cleaning out the loo cassette when Margaret arrived, a bit earlier than expected, to collect us. We had had breakfast and everything else was ready for us to go but I had left the loo until the last minute. Margaret had been out earlier for her morning run and had done another 10 km route, this one hilly.

 

The boys were up and about when we got to the house and all their toys were scattered about the floor. The TV was on and we had 'Jungle Book', 'Shrek' and 'Pinocchio' in the background throughout the morning. In the afternoon Dave and Bev were coming round for a braai but the weather in the morning wasn't looking too promising, overcast and the wind was cold. Justin had a friend from London staying in Cardiff for the weekend and he had arranged play golf with him in the afternoon.

Better weather for the braai.

 

Dave and Bev arrived about 2:00 pm and luckily the weather had improved considerably. It was very warm when the sun was out but the wind was still cool when some of the fluffy clouds covered the sun. All the toys were now moved outside on to the lawn at the back. Margaret erected a small tent for the boys to play in and a sand box from them to build castles; unfortunately Rhys liked to eat the sand. Ewan was dressed up in a fisherman's outfit he is wearing for a play he is in at the nursery school.

Fisherman Ewan.

 

Margaret had bought the little one-off disposable BBQ's at the supermarket, little metal trays with just enough charcoal to do one braai. She cooked chicken drumsticks, hamburgers and venison sausages. We had the meat with salad and garlic bread. It was very nice. At 6:00 pm it was time to clear up and while we picked up and put away all the toys, tent and chairs the other grandparents gave the boys their bath. A little later Justin got back, we had left him some of the meat from the braai for his dinner. His golf game was good for the first half but downhill for the second nine.

 

Once the boys were in bed it was time for us to go and Dave saved Margaret the trip to the campsite by driving us 'home'. It was on their way, they live in Caerphilly. When we got in the first job was again to make up the bed then I checked the TV. There wasn't anything on we wanted to watch so I read the paper and worked on the crossword before we got to sleep at our usual time.

 

It had been kisses and cuddles with everyone when we left as we head for Scotland in the morning. We will probably won't see them again until we make our way to the Continent again in the autumn.

 

 

 

 

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