We are at home.
We are not even at home in the sort of at home that happens when we are on the taxi rank. We got home and decided that we had quite had enough of adventures and that we really could not bear to go anywhere else or do anything else and that we would just eat pasta and have an early night.
I was so completely wiped out that I have not even washed the pots. We put them all in the dishwasher and explained to Oliver how to start it when he brings his own pots down later on. At least, I think we have explained it. It is so long since I have used it that I could not remember how it was supposed to work, and in the end Oliver just rolled his eyes and assured me that he would work it out.
I am sure that he will. He has been looking after himself for the last two whole days whilst we have been away. He has emptied the dogs and kept the fire going and everything. I told him that I was very impressed, and he rolled his eyes again and said Yes, I looked after myself in my own house all night and did not die, how clever I must be, and then laughed and went off to get on with whatever else he was doing.
I don’t care. It can be a very busy life when you are taking the dogs out and bringing firewood in and not making a mess.
It has been a very busy life whilst we have not been doing any of these things, I can tell you.
We went south on the train.
Trains are all right when you are in First Class, and the seats are comfortable and a nice young man comes and says Would You Like A Glass Of Wine Madam? but the first two trains did not have any first class, even though we had paid for it, and we had to sit in a horrid cattle truck opposite a man who was eating crisps with his mouth open and a girl who had so many ear rings stuck in her face that a magnet would have been a total disaster, and Mark had to keep nudging me to remind me not to stare.
Eventually we got a train with a properly civilised First Class bit, which was a massive relief, but when we got off it at Peterborough the rest of the trains for the night had been cancelled and so we had to harangue a miserable looking youth in a British Rail uniform who eventually said For Goodness’ Sake I Don’t Care, and rang us all taxis, which British Rail kindly paid for, so we made it to Huntingdon in the end.
The van was there.
It is amazing.
It is colossal. It is huge and red and full of space, also full of bits that the chap thought might be useful in a camper van and probably he was right because they are things like water tanks.
Also it is an automatic with cruise control and it is nothing at all like driving the old one, which always had something of a difficulty with second gear and unpredictable brakes. It does not seem to have unpredictable anything, except a bit fell off on the way home, and Mark had to pick it up and shove it in the back to be stuck back on later, but he said it does not matter.
We did not go home last night. Instead we went to see my cousins in Peterborough, who were very patient about it being the middle of the night when we arrived, and pretended not to mind at all. They politely fed us a great deal of wine and listened patiently to our stories about trains. We laughed a great deal, and I thought again how lovely it is to have relatives that I like so much. I could have talked all night but they wanted to go to bed, and so reluctantly we let them, we will have to go and see them again if we want to talk some more.
After that we stayed in a very nice hotel called Orton Hall, and ate too much breakfast before we set off this morning.
I have eaten too much of everything over the last few days. I will be very glad to get back to my usual diet of untroubling things that do not have a couple of shovelfuls of sugar in them. Everything seems to have sugar in it when you are travelling. We purchased some sandwiches on a service station in a desperate moment and even they had sugar in them, although they were supposed to be chicken. Even this morning’s breakfast yoghurt had sugar in it.
Eventually we chugged home, via Lucy’s house so we could show them the thrilling new massive truck, and finally got back here at eight o’clock, and now we are going to bed.
I have had enough adventures.
I am really looking forward to the dullness of tomorrow.
