How quickly our first week as Dorset residents has flown by. It has been taken up with unpacking and settling in to Nightingale Farm, stocking the kitchen and sleeping – lots of sleeping! I don’t think we realized how tired we were until we got here. Thanks to the lovely Jo and David, we are supremely warm and comfortable and our bed is like sleeping on a cloud.  Mind you, I think we could have slept on a park bench!  We started coming out of our fog after a few days and have been busy getting organized.

Firstly, and most importantly we have bought a car and will pick it up next Tuesday.  It will be such a relief not to be terrified of scratching the hire car in the lane. Jim is very confident but I am yet to get up the courage to drive in the lane where you have to back up to let approaching cars get past. Unless I want to be totally dependent on him there isn’t a choice though so I will just have to take a deep breath and launch myself.

Today we took a drive down to Weymouth with the aim of buying a small coffee pod machine.  They don’t seem to be as popular here but we found a Dolce Gusto machine that looks like a mini space capsule – I’m half expecting tiny little green folk to come out of it! It makes a good cup though. We had scones with strawberry jam and cream and a fresh coffee for afternoon tea – yum! Jim loves Devonshire tea but I don’t think it will love him if he indulges too often.

It was 13 degrees in Weymouth but with an extreme wind chill factor and freezing water. Didn’t seem to stop crowds of people enjoying the first Sunday since daylight saving by going to the beach.  There were people swimming and “enjoying” stand up paddle boarding and kayaking. How they could stay in the water is a mystery to me. They must have been close to hypothermia despite wetsuits.

Water fun and hypothermia at Weymouth.

Sunny 13⁰ day in Weymouth

Some of you probably know of our “Escape to the Country” obsession.  It would not be an exaggeration to say that our whole plan has been influenced by all the quirky, beautiful, ancient and fascinating places we have seen between houses. We have a very long list to tick off and this week we started by visiting R.J. Ralston and Sons – England’s Oldest Family Butchers. It was established in Bridport in 1515 and has only moved premises once about 200 years ago. From a long list of sausages, we chose the Tudor Rose Old English which, it is claimed, has been “a classic favourite for over 500 years.”  There is a suggestion that it was served to Henry V111 but that might not be true!! In any case they were perfectly pleasant, if not spectacular pork sausages.  The shop itself was tiny and crowded with low ceilings and it certainly felt ancient. Our first “Escape to the Country” suggestion ticked off.

The days will soon get longer and warmer here but at present it is still rather cold and we have had quite a lot of rain. Our house is cosy and we are enjoying curling up on the couch and taking naps in the afternoon. The first morning I was up at 4 am but today I didn’t get up until 7 so good progress. Jim, of course can sleep anywhere at any time and doesn’t seem to be affected at all by the change of hemispheres.  Except his sense of direction – and that’s a story for another day.