Anniversary

Despite promising ourselves a lie in, we were awake at 0630. Decided at that point we might as well stay awake. Came round to the chords of Pachabel playing on the i-pod speakers and reminisced about our wedding day. We hadn't thought 3 months ahead when we packed: Annelise had picked up some anniversary cards along the way and I handed over a "cotton" present: a new bikini. (not technically cotton, I know)

We had ordered breakfast for 9, so went for a morning stroll along the beach. A thoughtful person ( I guessed an employee of the villa) had raked the sand smooth from our villa to the sea. At least we were up early enough to put the first footprints in the sand. We investigated the other villas in our development, and were disappointed to find out ours was the smallest.

For breakfast I had a rare treat of Nutella on toast. Yum! A-lo gave the omelette a good review. Chilled by the pool to let breakfast go down, before doing the weekly chore: washing. The nearest washing service was charging an outrageous 50baht per kilo. As we had a lot, we (royal) carried the sacks along the beach and up a street to an old lady doing it for 20% less. All that to save a couple of quid. As I struggled across the soft sand with my burden, A-lo tagged along behind in a purely observational capacity.

Back at the villa, we read and dozed until lunch, and dipping and out of the sea and pool to cool down. The manager popped round to see us: Annelise's ex-boss, Robert, had stayed there recently with some friends and Michael said they seemed to have a fun time. Lunch was served: coconut and chicken soup, brown rice and satay. Delicious.

In the afternoon we discovered a bat and ball set and decided this was a sport we should be proficient at. We jumped in the shallow end and spent 10 minutes getting to a rally of 3 hits. After 45 minutes we were up to 28 hits and will be putting a bat and ball set on our Christmas list.

After all the exertion, Annelise was experiencing a 'muscle strain' in her right shoulder. The Masseuse was duly summonsed and before long a nice lady was walking up and down my back and kneeing me in the thigh. As I later watched Annelise receive a gentle back rub it dawned on me that there were other options as well as the default"Thai Massage" beating.

This was turning out to be one great anniversary! Day turned to evening as we lay on the daybed and listened to our favourite songs from when we met. (Yes - the outside bar had an awesome Denon sound system in it.)

For dinner we had grilled squid, mutant monster grilled prawn and a snapper stuffed with lemongrass and garlic, all cooked on the BBQ behind the kitchen and served up with the usual flotilla of smiles. Food was washed down with a pleasant sparkling French rose I'd picked up at the wine merchant next to Tesco.

To round off the evening we proceeded onto the beach where the lad from the villa lit a balloon lantern for us to launch into the night sky. We watched the illuminated cylinder ascend into the night sky, made a wish and carried on staring for several minutes until it joined the stars and eventually faded into space.