We still can't believe this weather. I got sunburned yesterday!!!! It's been absolutely gorgeous weather. We had a lovely day in Canterbury on Tuesday (the days are disappearing into a blur of relations and alcohol!). Penny was horrified that they wanted GBP9.00 to get into the cathedral so she opted to go shopping while Tony and I had a look around. It's a lovely cathedral and very busy. We strolled around Canterbury and looked at the buildings (I particularly like the Weavers Cottages) and did some shopping before we went home.

On Wednesday we went to Hastings and met up with another cousin and my auntie Lynn from London. Hastings is a bit grim and could do with a revamp but that seems to be the case with a lot of the seaside towns. The economic downturn has actually been a bit of a lifeline for them as more people are choosing to have domestic holidays than travel overseas. Auntie Lynn came back to Whitstable with us (note to self: never let Lynn direct you anywhere again...). She hasn't been here for some time and was very happy to catch up with people. On Thursday. Tony, Lynn and I went to visit my auntie Jean. She is the eldest of my aunts (81 years old) and has started to have a little bit of a struggle with reality but she was having a good day when we went and we all had a good laugh together. There was more catching up with relatives in the afternoon and then a fairly peaceful evening. Friday we went to Margate to visit some friends of mum and dad's and had a walk down to the seafront and a bit of a look around. On Friday night, Penny and Paul had got tickets for us to go to a local venue to see Adrian Edmondson's band - he was Vivien in The Young Ones. The venue wasn't especially good - we couldn't see anything, even on the TV screens - and the music wasn't especially inspiring - punk and contemporary against an irish background. We still had a good night; we had really nice chips and watched a brilliant sunset.

Another busy one on Saturday... it was my cousin Howard's birthday so we went to the op shop where he is working out his community service hours (don't ask - it's a long story) and gave him a balloon and birthday cards and then we went to the local museum (very small but cute) before a wander up and down the high street and a spot of shopping (three pairs of shoes, a handbag, a picture and some bananas). There was just time to dash home to get ready for our pub crawl. Four pubs, one sunset, several pints and lots of laughter later, we got back home to find the stayers still celebrating Howard's birthday so it was 1.30am before our heads hit the pillow. It's just lucky that there was a nice wall to hold Tony up because four weeks of drinking five times as much as usual finally caught up with him (don't worry - he's OK today and has managed to have his only alcohol free day since we arrived I think!).

This morning was more relative visiting and a lovely dinner provided by another cousin Deborah. We've had a really great time catching up with everyone but we're very happy to have a quiet night at home before setting off for Torquay tomorrow. It's just a one night stop before heading on to Truro in Cornwall. We're both looking forward to that.