Woke up at 3:50 to the sound of torrential rain. Made an executive decision to cancel our 450 appointment with the alarm, as it was clear that the boat trip was not going to happen.
Went back to sleep and woke again around 530 at which point we had an early coffee and watch the rain come down. We saw an elephant elephant demolish a small tree on the island and took some photos of that.
Took breakfast around eight-ish and learnt that our driver had arrived early at 9:30. Got ready to leave (including a safe opening ceremony with Chris – battery problem!) and said our goodbyes. Gillian and anonymous husband came with us across the wobbly bridge, while the Taylors (a.k.a. the Audley couple) await their driver. As it happens, their driver turns up as we cross the bridge and seems very keen to haggle with Mike over who takes whom – Daisy reckons that he saw us tipping and got a bit excited.
The splendid news is that the Audley couple is joining us at Huntingdon. So we tell her driver, Mike, to drive like the wind, in the hope of getting to our destination first and securing the best privileges.
As it happens, the paperwork informs me that we have been allocated the chapel.
Anyway, no one could drive too fast that day – the rain was relentless. This is the dry hot season, so called (in our experience) because it is cool and wet.
We see Gillian and anonymous husband at the Majete Gatehouse – or rather what is left of it – some wire netting on the roof of their vehicle has hit the thatch on the Gatehouse. Might have been an idea to exit on the other side, which is higher and which we did.
We drove through Blantyre and took a few snaps but there was little to see, especially in the rain and on and on market day.
We got to Huntingdon around lunchtime and took position possession of the chapel.
Amos showed us around (I don’t think he’s my cousin) [One of my many characters is a rogue named Amos who pretends to be my cousin].
We fiddled unsuccessfully with the safe. Amos offered us bacon pasta, then came to tell us that we were having vegetable quiche, but when I offered to go without, the order was changed again to steak sandwich – which was rather good. Daisy had a giant glass of red while I had a glass of stout.
We met Anette – Chip’s daughter-in-law – a glamorous looking Swedish lady, highly strung and with email address @fruitcakeunchained.com – says it all. The place might drive anyone around the twist mind you – she couldn’t make the safe work either, so gave me the key (which still didn’t do the job, as the key releases only). Nor did our own fresh batteries do the job – “He’s dead Jim.”
Eventually we went for a walk, but as it was close to dark and I was nervous of getting lost at nightfall. In the end we did a slightly bigger loop on the map suggested but still got back in good time.
Enjoy the early evening power cuts (more fiddling about) but were able to shower and went for dinner at eight.
Actually our early arrival had achieved something, as the team had assumed that the two couples arriving from Majete was a foursome and had set one table for four – that would’ve been nice – so Daisy disabused of the staff of that assumption & the tables had been reset. Us in the dining room adjacent to the chapel, theirs [The Taylors aka The Audley Couple] in the main dining room/lounge area.
Quite an austere set up for dinner (pumpkin soup – very good, chicken roulade – bland – chocolate brownie thingie – sweet and OTT but nice) with the generator shut down at nine and us left in the dinge with paraffin lamps and candles.
Still very pleasant and an early night seems in order/more or less compulsory.