Greetings From England!

Well, here I am, in the beautiful rolling countryside of the South of England. I'm near the town of New Milton, at the edge of the New Forest. (I've never been quite sure what happened to the Old Forest, or how one creates a new forest, and for the love of pete I think the new forest was started hundreds and hundreds of years ago, so I don't think it's all that new, but...)

Anyway, I digress. We landed in England on Friday morning, after a not-too-terrible journey. We flew San Francisco to Washington, D.C., had a stop-over of about an hour, and then Washington to London. It was, all total, a long journey, but breaking it into two legs gave me the illusion of not being cooped up in a plane for hours on end. (Since we had flown home the day before from Asia, the psychological aspects were very important, as I would have gone buggy if I thought about it...)

We got into Heathrow, jumped on the Heathrow Connect train into Paddington Station, then hopped on another train out to the town of Swindon. There were lots of young people on the train, with unnaturally-colored dreadlocks, body piercings, outlandish garb, rucksacks and sleeping bags, all of whom also got off at Swindon. Being the perceptive type that I am, I discerned that something was up. Well, apparently there was some sort of gathering of the tribes locally -- the Waveform Festival -- and I'm not sure what that is, but lots of people were congregating outside the train station at Swindon, waiting for transport to said festival. The bus showed up -- the "Festi-Bus" -- a garishly-painted double-decker, and they all hopped on, and took off. It was sort of surreal, as I really hadn't slept on the plane to the UK, and was a bit groggy. I think, as I type this, that perhaps I hallucinated the whole thing.

Anyway, in Swindon, we picked up this Land Rover the spousal unit had bought on eBay (I am not kidding you), and off we went. It's a great vehicle, and we felt so terribly British, we could barely stand it. On our drive to the South, the heavens opened and we were caught in a typical English downpour. But, we drove on. We stayed on the correct side of the road, and found our way to the town of New Milton. (Thanks to a good road atlas and our GPS system, which we brought with us.) Of course, as it's against my spouse's religion to book any accommodation in advance, we were then forced to wander about, seeking a bed at any B&B in the area. Nothing, nada, zip. Great. I was figuring we'd spend our first night in England sleeping in the damn car. But, then we saw a sign for a hotel... the Chewton Glen hotel. We figured we'd go there, see if there were any rooms or if they could refer us to alternate accommodation. I'm thinking it's going to be a nice, but mediocre, place. Oh, no, my friends. This place is GORGEOUS... It's a beautiful old typical English country house and a terribly exclusive hotel. Of course, there was only one room left, so we took it. It is beyond the expectations of even the famous Diva Tour (my former colleagues at The Company know whereof I speak)... I gasped when I saw the room rates, but figured if I got hit by a bus next week, at least I'd die happy.

This place is wonderful. Very quiet, very proper British. The grounds are immaculate, the rooms lovely, the china is by Villeroy & Bosch, the toiletries are Moulton Brown, and the bed is to die for -- at night, they put on this out-of-the-world fluffy duvet, and I'm a happy camper. The bed linens have a discreet embroidered crest on them, and the staff are out of some British novel... Ahhhh...

Yesterday, Saturday, the husband and I did the first day of the Beaulieu International Auto Jumble, and I had a wonderful time. After lunch, he went back to cruise the stalls and look for bargains, and I took a tour of the manor house and the ruins of the Cistercian abbey on the estate. My kind of place... Absolutely, positively lovely. When I get it together, I'll update this post with photos from the hotel and the Beaulieu estate, as well as some more thoughts on the experience.

But, for now, must log off. I'm going back to auto jumble with Himself, to check out YET ANOTHER CAR he wants to buy. Okay, then, twist my arm...

Hope all of you are having a lovely weekend.

Cheers!