Jenny's birthday! I bought Jenny a copy of 'Eats Shoots and Leaves' by Lynne Truss. She's an English teacher and would appreciate the zero-tolerance obsession over grammar that some of us share… Melissa warms croissants for breakfast and we are soon headed for Chawton, just outside of Alton, to see Jane Austen's house. It was fairly easy to find and was a gorgeous cottage surrounded by a beautiful garden in an olde worlde village. Inside the building were replicas of the furniture and crockery used, and illustrations all over the walls of characters from Austen's books, including the ones drawn by Jane's sister, Cassandra. After telling all the staff it was her birthday, we dragged Jenny away and went back down the road to Winchester.
Up in the Great Hall of Winchester Castle is the Round Table high on a wall, inspired by the legend of King Arthur and crafted c.13thC. In the middle of the hall was an exhibition on the World Wars as it’s the 60th anniversary of the end of WW2 (1945 in England). We grabbed a drink and lunch in O'Neill's pub where Melissa takes the opportunity of buying a meal and getting Jenny's for free, it being her birthday and all (!).
After lunch and a trip to the creepy loos (no lights, no locks, or no paper – take your pick) we visited the cathedral, which is the longest medieval gothic cathedral in Europe. It also holds in its library the famous Winchester Bible, a 12thC illustrated manuscript in six volumes. The library and cathedral was overrun with Italian students and we hung about in the gallery until most of them had left.
Back at the chalet we had pizza and Red Square followed by toffee & chocolate curls cake. We didn't have any candles so we lit a match, stuck it in the cake, and sang 'Happy Birthday' at twice the normal speed before Jenny blew out the match! We then turned on the music channels and flipped through the radio, singing along and dancing giddily around the coffee table. Fun fun fun…!
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