I have just broken the cardinal rule that I tell all of my clients who blog… if you are going to do it, keep it up… I know, I know, this one is very late….
I’ll try to keep it short: first up, since my last blog, I spent a restorative few days staying with some of my oldest (perhaps I should say longest standing) friends in what is apparently the highest, most remote lodge in the British Isles; basically hang a right a few miles before Blair Castle, turn off the main road, drive for 4 miles up a slightly pot-holed tarmac drive and then a further 8 up a monstrously pot-holed adventure playground (yep, I have a land rover…. so why oh why did I take my mum’s Honda Jazz? Patently failed to read the instruction email) The last 8 miles might have taken 2 hours (this picture is right at the start), but credit to Honda, the car got in and out in one piece, to the surprise of all…
I laughed like a drain for the duration. For anyone who likes a good read, google Antony Woodward – I can wholeheartedly recommend both Propellerhead and Garden In The Clouds, depending on your interests… I have known Ant for way more than half my life and even bought my dream BMW 325i soft top from him back in the 1990’s – a brilliantly funny writer, whose wit is matched only by Vez, his wife. I went for long, highly entertaining walks with my ‘flying’ godson, Tom (am now an expert on Japanese warfare), coming within less than 80′ of a golden eagle… saw beautiful things, with some of my favourite people, and left a much more chilled person (bar the 2 hour crawl to civilisation!).
Next stop the heady heights of Keysoe for H&H…. and moving swiftly on, the beautiful Eliza Manners’s 18th birthday party (I’m not biased), and her mother Emma’s birthday celebrations. I might not be good at parties, but this family know how to throw one – or two!
Of course reality always has to kick in and it was time for the Burghley/European Championships double. Having been semi-dreading it, it was ace… couldn’t do it without my partner in crime Ellie Crosbie. She does the creative stuff and I do the easy bit – but it seems to work. For Burghley I stayed with the wonderful ‘Growler’ (that’s another blog in itself) – more laughing like a drain… then for Blair I found myself ensconced in a lodge at the Atholl Palace – oh yessssss…. me, Ellie, Rupert Bell (radio) and Peter Morris (very important organising person) (all pictured, and I realise, quite blurry and slightly pink!). Quite how I managed the 9 hour drive home afterwards I will never know – probably pondering how Michael Jung can be THAT good.
Then it was down to Sussex and back to Rockingham to make plans for 2016, sadly more x-rays for my horse, and then to undoubtedly the most (for me) exciting job I will probably ever get… next time..