My grandmother would always say she was happy to see my brother, sister and I visit but always happier to see us leave after an exhausting time babysitting the three of us. I think this is how my in-laws felt after an exhausting 2 week tour of England, Amsterdam, Ireland and back to Clover, South Carolina. After several days in the hobbit house they were eager to stretch their legs in their large homestead in the States. I have to admit the England hobbit house is absurdly small for 4 people and a 40lb dog. We did our best by storing the two wardrobes which were kept in the spare bedroom in the garage and giving up drawer space by stacking clothes on top of wardrobes. Jeff's step mom Renee searched high and low for an outlet in the upstairs bathroom which is the largest of the two. I too was flummoxed as I helped her in her search. Finally, my beloved told me that it was illegal to have outlets in the bathrooms in the UK due to the poor mixture of 220 volts and water. This explains why my husband who has ownership of the upstairs bath has his dryer in the spare bedroom which has our wardrobes in it and just enough room to turn around. I in the meantime do not suffer this inconvenience as my bathroom is downstairs in the laundry room. I simply take two small steps out of the shower and plug my hair dryer and flat iron into the outlet next to the washer and dryer. I guess a running washing machine and a hair dryer is deemed safe by UK governmental standards. Renee spent a lovely two weeks hopping from the upstairs bath to the "wardrobe room" whilst curling her hair. She did an admirable job given the challenge. Now there is a second woman in the family that can vouch for the all day time consuming process of washing and drying a load of clothes with a dreaded UK washer/dryer. She soon gave up and by week two was drying her clothes on the rack outside in the sun. This is how we discourage those pesky out of town visitors.
My father in law didn't seem to mind. He commandeered the coffee table with his mini laptop and was set. My father in law only requires access to a laptop, camera and peanut butter and mayonnaise for his sandwiches to survive. Occasionally this varies to bacon and mayonnaise sandwiches for breakfast. He is a man of simple food requirements. I strongly suspect that our dog Shadow had more than his fair share of these sandwiches. He drank gallons of water during their stay and was always licking his chops. Whether this was due to the bacon or the peanut butter I cannot say for sure. He for certain was sad to see them go as he was the best food source of off limit goodies he has seen for awhile.
After a day and a half of rest and just when they were getting their feet under them we took them on a lengthy train ride to Amsterdam. Above is a picture of them on the train... perhaps we should have let them recuperate a little more at the hobbit house. We stayed at the Hotel Pulitzer which was a block away from the Anne Frank House. I honestly had no idea that Amsterdam was so beautiful with the canals and architecture of the buildings. I was also surprised at the scarcity of cars. Everyone from the young to the old was on bikes and they also like the cars had no respect for walking pedestrians. My father in-law Bill had a few close calls with the bikes and threatened to "drop" the next dutch native which cut him off. I knew he was serious (being from South Carolina) so I kept a close watch on him. During our time in Amsterdam we visited the Van Gogh Museum, the Anne Frank House, Heineken Brewery Museum, walked for miles and took a wonderful canal tour. The canal tour took us through the Red Light District which I had warned my father in-law about repeatedly. No pictures are supposed to be taken of the ladies working the windows of the district. My father in-law who is an avid photographer sporting two cameras and enough megabytes of memory stick to photograph a war felt he was safe from the bouncers in our little boat. Thankfully we were safe from the security in the middle of the canal as he snapped away and several ladies went scurrying behind doorways when they saw the camera. Never fear gals, your image is safe as his photographic technique involves raising the camera above his head and snapping away. This usually results in one good pic out of 10 and a blurred image at that! We had a fabulous time in Amsterdam, great food, great weather, bottled wine from Chile and Argentina (a must for Renee and I) and allot of laughs.
The time progressed at the hobbit house fairly rapidly. I believe the in-laws survived through sheer will and determination. They braved the tube independently and saw London on a double decker red bus, visited Windsor Castle, the London Eye and various other sites. I was a little peeved at first. It took them two days to master the London tube system while I was still hopping on the wrong damn train every other week for work. Despite the challenges of travel and the tiny hobbit house they pushed on. Do not get me wrong- they grew more weary by the day but pushed on due to their own unique intrinsic qualities which has made it work for them for over 29 years of marriage. My father in-law Bill will not complain even if there was a gun pointed at his head. He could be be bleeding profusely from a hit and run and he will say he is "just fine". Through long arduous frustrating days of travel he was "just fine". On his deathbed he will be "just fine" as long as there might be peanut butter and mayonnaise ingredients for a sandwich. During our trip from train station to train station, plane to plane, I would ask......Bill are you ok? Sweat would be dripping down his face and his color pale, chest heaving and weaving back and forth on his feet he would reply.....I'm fine. I cannot tell you the number of times I prayed. "Please God do not kill Jeff's dad while we are trying to show him a good time". Another plus to having my father in-law around is that he is what is lovingly known as a tinkerer. His tool shed in South Carolina could house 3 school buses with room for a few ATV's. Thus he was able to in no time at all have our little gas grill which has been sitting in the garage for a month up and running. He also put up a retractable hose wheel for us so that I no longer had to cart my sprinkler can back and forth to water our flowers. Oh happy days here at the hobbit house!
My mother in-law Renee is his complete opposite and like myself not afraid to voice her opinion. She will tell you exactly how she is feeling and how it can be improved on. Our "wine time" kept creeping up over the arduous 2 weeks. On day one we had wine at about 6pm. On the last day of the trip on the return ride to Heathrow Renee had packed wine for her 11 am departure. During our days of travel I would be thinking..... I so could use a glass of wine right now. Renee came to my rescue every time by stating " OK! Enough! Time for wine!" My thoughts exactly!
Our trip to Ireland was amazing. Cork is more beautiful than I could have imagined. The flight to Cork is only one hour from Gatwick airport. The challenge is flying the much dreaded Ryan Air to get there. Ryan Air is an Irish low cost airline which is very popular in the UK due to having the lowest fares to most tourist destinations. It is the largest airline in Europe in terms of passenger numbers. We were able to book 4 people to Cork and return for under £200 pounds. The caveat you ask? They nickel and dime you for everything else under the sun. If you do not check in on-line it is £20 to do so at the airport. If you check in online it is only £5 per person. You are permitted one bag which must include your purse and laptop. ONE BAG ONLY! If you buy anything at the duty free shop or airport prior to the flight it had better fit into that one bag. This one bag must weigh no more than 10kg. Any checked baggage will cost you dearly. Would you like to bring an infant and carry them on your lap? That will be £20 pounds each way. Their car booster? An additional £10. There are no assigned seats. If you would like priority boarding that will be £3 each way. Sodas and water on board are £2.50. Ryan Air have aimed to remove any non-essential items from their aircraft. The airline seats do not recline (which saves on seat maintenance), and lack seat pockets (which makes cleaning the plane easier. Pretty smart huh? The CEO made headlines here in the UK recently when he was considering charging for use of the toilet while in flight. The latest announcement is that they will abolish all checked bags and passengers who wish to fly with Ryan Air can check their bags plane side (for a fee of course) and only if they can get the extra or oversize bags through security. The end result of all this was that my in-laws ended up buying two very small suitcases which met the baggage requirement dimensions and weighed them carefully with our brand new luggage scale! After all that fretting and worrying about fitting only essentials into their carry-on the airline did not weigh them in the end! Instead, we were treated to their printer breaking down in the Cork departure lane where we needed to have our Visa's authorized and stamped prior to going through security. The broken down printer resulted in a 45 minute delay before they figured out they needed to open another line. I swear to you we would still all be standing there if I had not gone and found a member of the Ryan Air management team and got them on the case!! The Brits are too damn polite for their own good and will not make a fuss even if it means missing their flights. Now, this does not stop them from moaning about it while standing in line it just means that they do not want to be rude by calling attention to the problem and lodging an official complaint. This delay and the subsequent delay in the security line nearly caused us all to miss our flight. Our gate was at the farthest reaches of the terminal and we were only saved by my beloved sprinting ahead and stopping them from closing the door. I did indeed think my father in-law was going to have a heart attack then and there. He helps run the USO as a volunteer at the Charlotte airport and declared he had never seen such disorganization in his life. We ended up getting the last 4 seats on the plane.
Once we got to Cork things started to look up. The car rental service asked my husband if he would like a free upgrade from the touring wagon we had reserved to a minivan. Little did we know that the minivan was a 13 seat mini bus with a clutch! See the picture above for a close-up of my father in-law in row 3 seat 9. Try driving on the left hand side of the road from the right hand side of the car using a clutch and driving a van the size of the Partridge Family minibus on tiny Irish country roads. Jeff let me drive, proactively fastened his seatbelt and hung on. My father in-law shouted from row 3 "Downshift! Next Gear! Clutch! Clutch!" My mother in-law Renee shouted "she's doing great!" (Renee has a strong spirit for adventure) We stayed at the Sheraton Fota island Resort and Spa which is an absolutely beautiful hotel in Cork, Ireland. I would highly recommend it. The South West corner of Ireland is green, lush with an amazing coastline. We drove the Ring of Kerry and the Ring of Skellig, saw Blarney and Kinsale and had a magnificent time. Our only regret was that we needed more time. After an uneventful trip back with our bags stuffed full of souvenirs (only one bag) we made it back to the hobbit house.
I think it is safe to say that although I believe they enjoyed themselves our guests were more than ready to get back home and recover.
My father in-law handed me a memory stick with what I believe is close to a thousand pictures on it. I am waiting for an eventual rainy day here in Old Blighty to go through it all. It will remind me of warm, sunny, fun-filled days.
My father in-law handed me a memory stick with what I believe is close to a thousand pictures on it. I am waiting for an eventual rainy day here in Old Blighty to go through it all. It will remind me of warm, sunny, fun-filled days.
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