Saturday October 28, 2023
Hi All! We had a great day with our friends today. They live in a really nice area southwest of London near the University of Surrey. Like I mentioned the other day, my youngest daughter did her study abroad there and I was actually here for a few days visiting her about 5 years ago. Small world!
We spent the late morning driving around the beautiful English countryside. We drove into the quaintest little villages and also saw these beautiful mansions with lots of land. We drove by several places that used to be old English Pubs that were sold and converted to grocery stores or other businesses. It was sad to hear so many of the old pubs are going away.
Speaking of pubs, we had lunch at this cool old pub. It has been around since the 1700’s! The food was really good! I had the fish and chips (of course, when in England!) and the serving was huge. Kathy got a fun appetizer that they called “pigs in a blanket” but their version is a piece of pork sausage with bacon wrapped around it. So yummy!
We then came back to their house and relaxed for awhile. They have a beautiful house with this really neat back yard. They have a huge koi pond with almost 30 huge koi fish! It’s such a nice, peaceful setting. And they have a cute dog named Skyler that loves giving and receiving kisses!
We then went to dinner at our friends Annie and Alan’s house. They had joined us, along with Sue and Stuart, on our Norway cruise last year. Annie cooked up a huge meal that was so delicious. After dinner we watched the final game of the Rugby World Cup where South Africa beat New Zealand. After this weekend I actually know a lot more about Rugby!
So tomorrow we fly back to Charlotte. We’re really sad to leave our friends. While it was a short visit, we really enjoyed seeing them all again. We’re already planning a return trip to visit and maybe do some traveling around England and Wales. That would be so fun!
I hope everyone is having a good weekend! Our standby flight from Heathrow looks good with about 50 open seats right now. Wish us luck! I’ll do one last entry after we arrive back to Charlotte!
The Wandering Italian 