A little bit more of Cuba

I thought I really ought to say that despite sitting through a roaring catagory 2 hurricane, we had a good time. Cuba is a beautiful place, very green and picturesque. In between the showers the sun was lovely, before the storms the sea was the turquoise blue of the Caribbean, despite the fact we were on the Atlantic side of the island.  It quickly returned to this lovely colour a few days after the storm although it didn't completely calm down. We had lots of fun snorkeling off the beach and off a boat, there was more to see underwater then I expected. I loved to see Little Miss at only 9 years old, snorkeling in the sea for hours and diving down if anything on the sea bed took her eye - we were so proud of her. Me being of that Jaws generation still has to keep looking behind me every few strokes!

We went horse riding and fishing and did so much swimming, although one pool was still out of action when it was time to leave.
We played table tennis, and badminton (in a strong wind!!) and ate a lot, oh yes we ate huge quantities of everything - or maybe that was just me, I couldn't possibly confirm or deny that!

The builder managed to lose one of shoes on the day of arrival (must have fell out of our bags when we had to swap rooms). That doesn't sound too bad but bear in mind he only owns one pair being that he lives in trainers or work boots! So every night at dinner I had to stand in front so as to hide his feet - proper shoes were required for dinner, and sneak him into the restaurant! He enquired at reception everyday for the missing shoe (20 years old, black lace up?) - they had us earmarked as the slightly mad family as we queued at reception behind people asking when water would be restored, when their roof would be repaired, whether there was any more drinking water available - then us, "have you seen a left shoe similar to this one?"!

We had no water to the rooms for 3 days and every one had to take buckets to the swimming pool to bring back and flush the loo or wash with. Husband decided that was too much of a palaver and covered himself in shower gel early one morning and went for a swim - the trail of soap suds behind him was a little telling! We had no TV for days and the drinking water started to run out. However they kept the enormous buffet running so we were happy!

The boys managed quite a bit of this.......

number 1 son bowling

number 2 son batting

Not sure who sneaked the bat and ball into their suitcase!

Despite all of the above I will very much look forward to going to Cuba again one day. We didn't visit as many places as we'd have like to as roads were closed but we did spend lots of quality family time together - albeit some of it huddled together in the dark while a hurricane raged outside!

 

I failed miserably to get number 1 son to buy a T-shirt like this

 

which I wanted him to wear to his next A level politics class -

 if only to wind up his slightly right of centre tutor!

 

And even more disappointingly, after cleverly matching my nail polish to the exact colour of the sea, they changed the damn colour of the sea!

 

But it wasn't all bad, on the day before we flew home, guess what turned up? The builder's missing shoe! So he was correctly attired for at least 1 evening meal out of 14. I wasn't very happy about that in actual fact as it was all I could think of to buy him for his birthday & Christmas - 1 black shoe!

Well that is the last holiday post - life goes on and already we've been home for over a week.
The weekend just gone I hosted a charity Christmas fair (bad planning to have it 6 days after we got home!) so we were as busy as ever..... and the indoor cricket continues......

Holiday Fiasco 2012, part 2

Well after a restaurant meal on the resort where we were battered by wind and rain (open sided restaurant) which was very bizarre. I sat at the table in my thick fleecy fur-lined jacket with a little smirk on my face - I'd been ridiculed for taking a winter jacket by the whole family - I hate the cold and always take some sort of jacket or coat to wear on the journey home. However it was just the right attire for the evening! We had silver service to the table and  wine to taste before it was served - this was all a bit like a comedy film as the wind & rain whipped & drenched us; only on one side! The middle of the restaurant was slowly flooding too.

You can see which side of me faced the outside - that'll be the very wet side of my jacket (lovely warm jacket!) Sorry about the odd photo, we all had to pull funny faces!

We had been given very little information about the approaching storm although the hotel advised that no alcohol would be served at the bar after 6pm (it was still served in the restaurants??) and that they would deliver breakfast to our room the following morning. Apparently the storm should make landfall outside our front door at 11pm. By 11.30 it was blowing a gale but no more that a bad English storm so we all went to bed. At 3am we were woken by the children running through to our room shouting that water was pouring through their ceiling; and it was, quite a lot! We hopped out of bed to go and look, well more accurately sploshed out of bed as what we couldn't see in the pitch dark was that we had around 4 inches of water on the floor!

Outside we could hear the storm although not see very much at that time; it was so noisy and quite scary. The electricity was out and the TV had been out since the evening before so we knew very little about what was happening anywhere other than in our room.

As time wore on a little daylight began to appear and we sat at the french doors looking out, trees bending at right angles, debris everywhere, and so much water. We could hear the sea roaring and we were the first line of villas after the beach. As we sat there with our noses pressed against the glass I received a text from a friend in the UK which said "I hope you're ok and still wearing your diamante bikini in the hurricane shelter - I guess you need to take cover and stay away from any windows"! What? Windows? Hurricane? Doh! Are we stupid or what??

just get a bit closer to that sheet of glass, it's only a hurricane!

Anyway as the sun came up the devastation was obvious all around, trees down, bits of the plastic cladding from the hotel strewn everywhere. And on top of what was happening outside we had to chase this little chap out of the room!

 As soon as we were able to leave the room, around 6.30am, we did.

 

The place was a mess, flooded everywhere and trees down all over the resort.

Lots of people (English in the main!) were starting to come out to explore and there was a very eerie feel to the place - we really felt like we were on a film set.

We went to look at the sea, we could hear it before we saw it. The beautiful turquoise blue water of the days before now resembled the North Sea on a blustery winter day.

 

Remember the massage hut from the previous post? This is it now

Can't see it? No neither could we!

And the lovely wedding pergola





More battered than it looks in this photo

 I felt sorry for all those who had hoped to hold their wedding ceremony here over the next few days,  it was half torn apart and clearly unsafe to use.

One of the a la carte restaurants had the roof torn off as did some of the hotel rooms!

We realised we'd been very lucky with our room!

 

 

 

 

The pool areas were such a mess,    sunbeds and trees were strewn about, and many in the pools.

 

The restaurant we'd eaten in the night before was a wreck....

Lots of water flooding the place and furniture strewn everywhere.

 

After a good explore we went back to our room for the promised delivery of breakfast - bearing in mind we'd just got used to the "all-you-can-eat-buffet" 4 times a day the soaking wet cheese roll (looking ever so much like a sponge), a flat banana (think it had been sat on) and bottle of water each delivered by a very brave member of staff on a golf buggy really didn't cut the mustard!

 

The staff at the hotel were amazing and worked so hard, most had been unable to get home and by now the roads were closed anyway. Several we heard had lost their homes but they worked tirelessly to get some normality back to the resort. Trees were cleared, the lobby was mopped and soon the lunchtime restaurant was back up and running - don't let it be said that a hurricane kept us away from the next meal!

Oh so typically English - shorts & flip flops just because we are on holiday!
 

Anyway I seem to be running on a bit - I think I'll do a part 3, or will that be too much? We did have a great time (between showers!) and Cuba is a very beautiful and very interesting country.
The aftermath of the storm was felt in the resort for some days, despite the fabulous efforts of the staff. I think you knew more in other parts of the world than we did in Cuba - we had no TV for days and the information we were given was limited to say the least!

I'll post a little about the good bits as soon as I can if that's ok?
Thanks for everybody's concern at the time, I did see a couple of comments when we eventually got some sort of connection and it was so cheering to know we were being thought about..

 

Holiday Fiasco 2012!

Well we made it back home safely, so hold that thought as you read about this years adventure. It may take 2 posts to bring you up to speed so here goes....

We picked all three excited children up from their respective schools on Friday October 19th and set off for Manchester; the builder hates to set off so early (we were due to fly Saturday at 10.30am) but after years of problems, mistakes and me generally worrying so much I start to cry he has given in to my demands! The drive took an age, we're about 4 to 4 and a half hours away from Manchester and it was the busiest time of the week on the roads. We had chosen to fly from Manchester so we could get a full 2 weeks in without extra days off school, Little Miss and number 1 son already needed 5 days off for the holiday as it was. Number 1 son is in sixth form college and they wouldn't authorise a holiday so he's marked down on their records as having taken an "unauthorised absence"!

We stopped on the way for some food & drink at a motorway "welcome break" - not that welcoming as we seemed to need a bank loan for a small snack! Then on to the travelodge; well that has to be the darkest, dampest grimmest place I've ever had the displeasure to stay in - however it was a means to an end.

All the way from home until arrival at the airport the following day I checked, double checked, then checked again all the paperwork, passports, visa's etc. I had printed and brought with me every scrap of paper relating to the holiday, just to cover every eventuality. As I found out later in the holiday every eventuality can not be covered!

However the kind lady on the check in desk let us all through to the departure lounge, non of the bags were over weight and all was looking rosy. I did get pulled over at security as I had a hairspray in my bag but it was small enough to be allowed through (I'd double checked that!). And the flight was on time..... nothing could go wrong now.

After an uneventful flight we were in Cuba, yes they let us in! The tour company coach met us and did a fabulous en-route check in so that on arrival at the hotel we already had our room keys, restaurant reservations and all the necessary information we needed. We disembarked the coach and enjoyed the champagne we were handed. We were a little nervous of the very dark cloud hanging over the hotel and after exploring the resort a little the heavens opened. But it's just a tropical rainstorm, not unexpected, and Cuba is so green and lush, they must have a reasonable amount of rain.

 

The hotel had a beautiful pergola in the sea for weddings

 

And a massage hut with waves lapping around it's supports, I noted that for later in our stay!

The heavens opened more that evening and we saw a lot of this

 

This picture is taken from the reception/bar area which is open sided, the rain was the most torrential I have ever seen; and I live in England!

 

However the sun was shining on day 2 and we did a lot of swimming, the snorkeling out from the beach was better than we had expected and kept everyone entertained until the next meal.

Food on the resort was on tap 24/7 and I for one made the most of it!

           The 10lb's I'd lost before went is almost all back on!







 The evening restaurants were the best we've ever had too 

Sorry it's a dreadful photo!

We went to a local market for shopping on the Tuesday as it was a little overcast, and had a taxi ride in one of the old American cars, a Chevrolet I think.


But when we got there the rain began again, so we dodged under a tarpaulin stretched between two trees to keep the sun off the stallholders; we never actually left that spot and the taxi arrived to take us back to the hotel 45 minutes later!

And then the next day strange things began to happen around the hotel. We were confused. The display of awards in the lobby area went from this

 

 

to this....

And all the lights and chandeliers hanging in the restaurant and lobby areas were discretely removed.

Then we noticed that the canoes, pedalos and sail boats had been moved from the beach and placed in the middle of the hotel garden! The beach sun loungers were carried into the gardens too and tied together....Whatever was going on?

There was a queue of people approaching the reception desk but we ignored them and headed out to enjoy the sun which later appeared from out of the clouds.

 Some while later we spotted a couple of notices which had been put up in reception for the guests, the children thought it was all very exciting, me? not so much!

 

 

 Apparently a storm was heading our way, information was very limited, a game of Chinese whispers went on amongst guests! Tropical Storm Sandy was on it's way to Cuba. We later found out that it turned into a "strong category 2" hurricane shortly before it made landfall in Cuba. (Landfall? I've picked up the hurricane lingo already!)

 

The maps above show where the path of the hurricane was due to go; where exactly were we staying? A place on the north coast called Guardalavaca - marked on this map - see Club Amigo (not where we stayed but I borrowed the photo from the internet. I am computer illiterate so don't know how to edit the photo of the hurricane path to show our resort!)

 

So yes we were directly in the path of the hurricane. Time to batten down the hatches and see what the evening brought. By this time I was more than a little alarmed!

 

I'll continue the tale on another post - this is far too long and probably not that interesting to anyone else.

 

We're back!

Well we're back home, all five of us, all in one piece so it can't have been too bad!

We only arrived home this afternoon so I'm still jet lagged and up to my eyes in washing, I will compile a holiday post, for what has to be the most eventful trip we've ever had, in the next few days - boy was it eventful!

But while we were away I realised in my last post I didn't mention our last holiday (before this one) in 2011, which had a story all of it's own....

2010 was quite a trying year for us with the recession having quite an impact on the builders business and we were all a bit frazzled as we approached the autumn. The builder had a big birthday approaching so I took it upon myself to book a holiday in secret, I have a friend who's a travel agent and she helped me sort it all out. I chose a 10 day trip to the Red Sea coast of Egypt, we all love to swim in the sea, we all snorkel a lot and some enjoy diving. We'd been to the Red Sea once before when I was pregnant with Little Miss ( a holiday punctuated by my travel/pregnancy sickness - I was car sick, plane sick, coach sick and sea sick!) But we loved it there - only a 5 hour flight from the UK and it has every thing we look for in a holiday.

I arranged time off school for the children, trips, parking - everything we needed. And on the BIG birthday morning, December 1st, we presented him with the envelope - the children didn't really know what Dad's present was so there was a lot of excitement.

Our holiday was at a lovely resort with a huge pier (jetty) out into the sea to make snorkeling and diving easier.

We were to be right next to the coral reefs so we didn't have to hire a boat to dive - unless we wanted to.

Everyone went off to school and work very excited that in only 8 weeks we'd be diving with Nemo and his friends.

Later that morning I had a 'phone call from the builder - had I heard the BBC news? What was the resort we were going to? My answers were No and Sharm El Sheik.

Do you remember the news in December 2010? It took up pages in the newspapers and was all over the internet........ 4 people had been attacked by a rogue shark in the Red Sea.... where exactly? Sharm El Sheik!! The scaremongering went on for quite a while in the UK press which didn't help.

This is par for the course with our holidays and needless to say we had a nervous time in the sea, well I did; number 2 son thought it was far more exciting potentially swimming with a  man eating shark that a few colourful fishes!

Maybe we did tempt fate a bit though...... this is where we chose to dive.....

(Not our actual photo, it seems to be missing so I've borrowed this from the web.)

Anyway we did have a lovely time and as it turned out it was quite uneventful, thank God!

 

I'll be back soon with "Holiday Fiasco 2012"!

.

Summer Holiday Time!

I know that most people are turning their thoughts to Christmas, in blogland there seems to be lots of posts about crafty Christmas decorations. I know we have Hallowe'en and Bonfire night before Christmas but everywhere I look there are signs of Christmas festiveness!

I refuse to even think about anything Christmassy; I haven't had my summer holiday yet!

Due to the cricket overload from Easter to September when no one in this house (apart from me) will consider going more than 10 metres away from the nearest pitch we only manage holidays during the cooler months - despite the abundance of indoor net cricket, indoor tournaments, practice sessions and of course the County trials (a little more about that later). And holiday time for us starts on Friday, hooray!

We are driving up to Manchester after school on Friday and fly to Cuba on Saturday morning, to the sunshine - and I can't wait!  Number 2 son has a 2 week half term but the other 2 children are taking a week off school and college - yes we are in trouble with the college about time off at the start of his A level course. It's very difficult to explain to the school that we're unable to go away in the summer school break due to our cricket commitments. They don't seem to understand that in this families list of priorities cricket is much higher up than school and therefore it's more acceptable to miss some school than miss some cricket! It's probably the last time we'll all go away together anyway so a bit of family time lounging on a beach (playing beach cricket no doubt!) is called for.

I can't wait to be on that beach with a cocktail in hand, I love the heat and hate cold weather. One day I will spend all of the UK winter somewhere hot, not everyone's cup of tea I know.

However until they take our bags at the airport and we are sitting in the departure lounge I will be a nervous wreck! We have travelling history you see......

We're lucky enough to have been abroad quite a few times but it is rarely without some sort of catastrophe!

I've been stuck in flash floods and missed the plane

We almost missed our honeymoon flight due to M25 traffic, had security been as it is now we wouldn't have made it - the staff allowed us to bypass all security checks and board the plane minutes before it took off!

On our 3 city honeymoon (flights between each city) - our luggage was lost, there was no reservation for one of the connecting flights and there was no record of the booking at the final hotel.

On the return flight from our honemoon someone had a cardiac arrest and we touched down in Moscow (not allowed off the plane) and the journey became a 36 hour flight!

We booked an ocean front hotel in Florida which turned out to be several miles from the ocean when we arrived. We quickly moved out of the hotel, the toenails on the bedspread being the final straw!

We arrived at Gatwick to find number 2 son's passport had expired and he was not allowed to fly - that is a whole story of it's own as I had a fear of driving but had to bring him home with no map or SatNav and then organise a new passport and fly out to Turkey a few days after the rest of the family! I drove home and cried all the way, it was a great diet though as I lost 6lb's in 3 days!

We had a weekend in Dublin, flying from Norwich - they cancelled the flight so we stayed in a hotel 8 miles from home for 2 nights as we had a babysitter in place.

We attempted a second trip to Dublin and got there, but they cancelled the flight home! We flew into Birmingham and were bussed back to Norwich, not great for me as I developped 'flu and a sickness bug at the start of the journey!

We have had numerous delays on flights but once we actually arrive we have the BEST holidays - well apart from the fly drive in Florida where we squeezed 3 arguing kids into the back of a tiny car and attempted to drive to the Keys - I will never repat that trip, we very nearly dumped all 3 of them at the side of the highway and drove off!

So wish me luck for Friday, if it's an uneventful trip it'll be unusual. I'll look forward to catching up with everyone when we're home, and then we can think about Christmas - not before then!

Ps - just an update about the County Trials for both boys which I mentioned here - it's all going very well & I want to thank everyone for their good luck messages. Both boys are through to the second round of trials which is usual for number 2 son but not for number 1 son who apparently played amazingly well in the net session. So keep everything crossed for them both, I don't expect this year to have a different outcome than previous ones but you never know....

An accidental collection

The work on our house is nearing the end, can't believe I'm saying that after all these years! The foundations were laid for the extension 7 years ago and my "to do" list at the time was -

build extension

decorate and furnish new rooms

decorate the rest of the house

and to re-do some of the things we did when we renovated the house the first time around,

20 years ago.

 

The first time we renovated the house it was to convert 2 almost derelict cottages into 1 three bedroom house, we were on a very tight budget and some of the things we'd have liked to have done were just too expensive. So we (and by that I mean I) started to make a list of things we could tackle the second time around. Unfortunately during that 20 year period, 3 children arrived and I began to work part time (for a while not work at all) so money became tighter and life generally got in the way a bit!

 

After we'd finished the house the second time I thought we'd tackle the garden which is very messy (neither of us have even 1 green finger between us!) and then lay a nice cobble driveway and then live happily ever after - the whole lot should take about a  year shouldn't it?

So 20 years after we started and 7 years after phase 2 we're actually seeing light at the end of the tunnel! And it's looking good. The laundry room now has a replica pamment floor, we re-installed the belfast sink but now with a solid wood worktop which I'm in love with. There's a new fridge freezer which dispenses ice - probably the best toy the kids have ever had! and the 200 year floor bricks we'd stored outside for the past 20 years have been cleaned and laid at the entrance to the extension.

a little niche in the wall we found





please excuse the washing hanging up!

It's a little hard to photograph as it's a long narrow room, but I'm really pleased with the results.

There are still a few more things to do - put the cupboard door on, finish the painting, oil the worktop etc - that's my weekend sorted!

I also unpacked my old bottle collection and arranged them in the entrance

 

 

 

my favourite conical shaped Schweppes bottle

 

This is not an intentional collection, I try not to collect anything as I think I may have an obsessive tendency and wouldn't stop until I had a full set of anything! These are all bottles we dug up in our garden, and there were many more than just these ones too! We have quite a long garden and along the left hand side is a row of farm cottages who's gardens back onto our boundary. It appears that many moons ago everyone buried their rubbish, and mostly they threw it over the fence into our undergrowth - that or the previous owners of our cottage like a drink or 10!

The bottles range from earthenware beer bottles from the local Steward and Patterson brewery to torpedo shaped glass bottles and my favourite is the conical Schweppes bottle shown in the last photo, I really ought to do a bit of research to learn more about them, I may have one worth millions!

Sorry for the random positioning of these photos, they seem to re-arrange themselves when I preview or publish, why is that?

Have a lovely weekend everyone - I'm trying to catch up with all your blogs as we're 2 missing this weekend. The builder is away on a music (read drinking) weekend and number 2 son is on an RAF cadet weekend sleeping in a tree most probably. I'm off to the cinema with number 1 and Little Miss later, feeling very guilty that my other child is sleeping rough for 2 nights wearing heavy and probably damp army issue clothing and only armed with a pot noodle for sustenance!!