We spent Thursday on a very pleasant walk in the Peak District. Acutally... it was a bit harder than I thought it was going to be. Fortunately it was so lovely that my auntie very kindly didn't disown me! I'd read about the walk through Cave Dale in my guidebook and it sounded lovely so we asked David and Corinthia if we could go there and they very kindly volunteered to take us. David does a lot of walking up hill and down dale and I felt somewhat underprepared as I watched him and Corinthia don their walking socks, hiking shoes, wet weather gear and hiking stick! As we drove through the amazingly high hills, it occurred to me that it was called the Peak district for a reason and perhaps the walk wouldn't be so easy. The village of Castleton which is where the starting point for the walk was, is a picture postcard village of stone buildings and little streams nestled between the hills. The start of the walk was quite steep but we stopped frequently to enjoy the view ahead and behind which included the ruins of Peveril Castle atop a hill. There were the most gorgeous lambs with black faces and legs and white bodies all over the place and the fields and hills were crisscrossed by amazing drystone walls, some of which were practically vertical! We climbed stiles (just for fun - there were always gates) went through gates and cut through fields and eventually we came to Blue John Cave. Blue John is a semi-precious stone and it's mined only in that one hill - it's the only place in the world that it occurs. The cave is a working mine and we had a guided tour - 245 steps down; 245 steps up. Definitely somewhere flat for the next holiday! Anyway, we asked the guide for a quick way back the village and he said "Go through these two gates then go around the edge of the hill and you'll be in the village in 25 minutes." When he said the edge of the hill, I thought he meant down the bottom but what he really meant was half-way up the hill next to a sheer drop is a goat path made of slippery shale. It was at this point that I though my auntie Corinthia was going to kill me or disown me! It was forty minutes later that we walked into the village... Fortunately there was a very attractive tea room serving devonshire tea (but they're called cream teas here because we were in Derbyshire not Devonshire). That was lovely, scones, jam, clotted cream and an extra 10p to have coffee instead of tea. It started raining when were on the way back home and that's the only rain we've seen since we got here. We had a fantastic day - really enjoyed it. It was finished off by meeting my cousin Marcus and his wife Rebecca (Alfie's parents) and having a nice fish and chip dinner with them (no mushy peas for me!)

Yesterday we left David & Corinthia's and travelled to Leeds to meet a guy Tony has been in touch with for about ten or more years through North Melbourne Cricket Club. They were both very pleased to finally meet up with each other and there was a couple of hours of chat before we left to start our 4 hour drive to Norwich down the A1.

We got to Tony's cousin Dennis and his wife Keri at about 8.00pm and talked until midnight over a Chinese takeaway.

Today was the day of the big match... Tony and Dennis went off to see Norwich v. Coventry and I headed for some retail therapy while Keri visited her mum. The sound coming from the ground was absolutely phenomenal - I could hear them from where I was shopping. They were having a great time and I found a place that sold sky lanterns - they were only 1.50 so I got five. I met up with the boys and they'd had a great time - really enjoyed the game. Back at Dennis and Keri's, we had an early dinner because we're off to the pub soon to see a Pavarotti impersonater/spoof. I've never had a half a chicken before and I'm very glad I opted for salad and not Dennis' choice of chips, peas and gravy!

No idea what we're up to tomorrow - might even actually unpack the suitcases!