Greetings from Yorkshire!

We had a good flight over with a small glitch in that the Underground was on strike but we managed to get a taxi without too many problems and arrived at King's Cross in pretty good time and almost immediately got an express train to Leeds. It's been so great to have some cooler weather and we've been sleeping like logs (didn't get up until noon today!).

Susan and Alan have been spoiling us with all sorts of delicacies and it's so relaxing to be driven about and not have to navigate and all that stuff. Thursday we went to Nunnington Hall which is a very interesting manor house. Lots of interesting things to see and I especially enjoyed the many miniature scenes the lady of the manor had collected and partially created. Having been deprived of a doll house I have a special affinity for these.

We had the best ploughman's lunch ever in a famous pub called the Star in a little village called Harome. There was rarish steak, duck, smoked chicken, chicken salad, chutney, salad, three type of wonderful local cheeses and I'm sure I've forgotten something. Seems this pub restaurant came close to getting a Michelin star but couldn't get it because it is listed as a pub and Michelin doesn't rate pubs. Got talking to some folks there who mentioned the AA Pub Guide 2004 which is rather new I think so we've got that now and are avidly planning pub crawls in Dorset!

It's so neat being back in Yorkshire. The countryside and the little villages are just so wonderful. Looking forward to going to York this evening and having dinner with Alistair and Jenny and seeing their new house. Perhaps we'll even get in a bit of back yard cricket...