Holiday!

After having to postpone our group holiday in France for the second time, the eleven of us who live in the UK decided that we'd at least replace it with something we were allowed to do this year so we went to Norfolk. Rather than the usual huge chateau, we booked three holiday cottages close to one another so we could do indoor activities in groups of six or fewer, and bigger groups outdoors.

It was really really good. A bit weird, being around so many people after so long, but I was surprised how quickly it started to feel normal again. We spent a day in Norwich, with Mass at the Cathedral, a visit to Mthr Julian's anchorage, lunch on a rooftop restaurant, and then all going off and doing our own thing a bit - leonato & I went round the Castle Museum, which is about half mini-V&A with random Stuff(tm), and about half art gallery, with mostly local artists.

We had two readthroughs, of Arcadia and A Man for All Seasons (having worked our way through all the plays about Thomas Beckett, we needed other martyred Thomases for emperor to play ;). Probably the highlight of those was the bit in Arcadia when the_alchemist borrowed Florizel's toy rabbit to use as a prop hare, and he was extremely but adorably unconvinced that anyone else should be allowed to play with it.

We went to Blakeley Point to see seals, which came with bonus liv and jack, who by coincidence were also on holiday in Norfolk this week. We were really lucky, because apparently most of the seals had buggered off a couple of weeks previously and then only reappeared the week we were there, but we got loads of them. I particularly enjoyed the contrast between some (I guess the younger ones?) who were really sleek and graceful and mermaid-like, and others who were great big galumphing beasts.

We had a day at the seaside where I swam in the sea a lot, and then ate about my entire body weight in fish and chips, and then about the same again in ice-cream. I did get a bit sunburned, but it was definitely worth it.

As well as swimming in the sea, atreic found a lovely river spot a few minutes drive from the cottages, so we also swam there, including some (very) mild peril jumping in from swings and overhanging trees. I really enjoy outdoor swimming, but am very bad at remembering that it's a thing I like doing unless atreic instigates it, so I might try to be a bit better at doing it myself this year.

We had two extra Masses in addition to Sunday's. On Tuesday evening we went to King's Lynn Minister, where our friend Fr Angela is a curate, and then had an excellent dinner with her and her partner, Sue, outside a restaurant on the quayside. On Wednesday we went to Walsingham for the morning, and went to Mass at the Guild of All Souls, where Fr Andrew Greaney, formerly parish priest of Little St Mary's is now the Chantry Priest. I hadn't actually warned him who we were, so it might have been a bit of a gentle shock to find that half a dozen of his former parishioners were visiting, but we had a nice catch-up and reminisce over coffee.

On Thursday we all had a fairly lazy morning except kht, who spent most of it making pancakes for the rest of us. In the afternoon we went on a hike, although my knee was complaining slightly, so I bowed out about half way round, which was made easy because of atreic's excellent planning for hikers with varying appetites for going a long way. That evening we ate out again, in the beer garden of a local pub.

After a week of mostly glorious weather, on Friday the heavens opened, which did perhaps make those of us who spent the morning canoeing question our life choices slightly. We still managed to enjoy ourselves though, and saw herons and grebes and wherries, and despite all the water coming out of the sky and into the boats, we managed not to drown, so all was well.

Now I'm about equal parts glad to be home in familiar space and seeing obandsoller and robert_jones again, and missing people terribly and wishing we could be on holiday forever.