Whether the weather be fine, Or, whether the weather be not, Whether the weather be cold, or whether the weather be hot, we’ll weather the weather Whatever the weather, whether we like it or not.
Except I didn’t and I don’t.
The weather has just been flipping awful. I have had enough of it. We are just days away from when the nights start drawing in and there has not yet been one balmy evening when we could sit outside until its dark and still be warm. Instead, we are still wrapping up with hoodies and fleeces and that’s when it not raining. I am fed up with getting wet and cold playing golf, not being able to do jobs in the garden and hearing the heating click on in June.
Next year I have decided we are going away in June to warmer climes. That will make sure it is hot and sunny in Norwich instead.
We had come close to booking a trip to Portugal for this week this year using the new Ryanair flight from Norwich but had prevaricated about it during which time the flight cost quadrupled which served us right and put pay to that idea. So instead, we put together a trip based around Karen’s desire to do the ‘Call the Midwife’ tour around Chatham Docks. Initially it was going to be for 2 nights until we realised that the tours only take place on a Wednesday during June by which time, we would have already been home, so we extended the trip by another day. Another day where we could hopefully enjoy more of the beautiful British weather….
In the intervening period since our last trip, we had crammed in as much as possible. Highlights had included seeing Take That at Carrow Road, watching the England T20 match against Pakistan at The Oval and visiting my friend Anthony in Essex after his hip operation.
So, on the Sunday after Karen had visited her Mum in the care home first and having celebrated Father’s Day with the boys the day before with a damp BBQ, we set off towards Kent. We had a brief stop to drop off a birthday card to Tracey before driving down the A11. Our next stop was Ikea at Lakeside as Karen wanted to get some more of their sandwich bags (yes really). Of course, other things were surreptitiously slipped into the basket as we went around.
Then we crossed the bridge into the garden of England. I had booked the King Charles Hotel which had good reviews when I had looked on Hotel.com and was located close to Chatham docks in Gillingham. The first impression though was not good. The entrance was like going through a pot holed building site. The building itself looked like an old utilitarian crumbling office block. Good job I was with easy going Karen who never murmured a word about how she would rather sleep in her car than stay here. As I said we would have to pay for the first night regardless I said we should at least see inside.
The receptionist was friendly and helpful. Everywhere seemed clean inside and they were obviously trying to make an effort. The layout and décor though was very much stuck in the 1980’s. We took the old small creaky metal lift to the 2nd floor. Our room was spacious, clean (although Karen found a cobweb high in one corner) and apart from some evidence of damp in another corner was almost fine. It had the smallest TV that was possibly state of the art in 1980 and a very dated long pine desk. Still, it had tea making facilities and after a welcome cuppa it didn’t seem quite so bad. The welcome booklet in the room said that the building was originally the NAAFI for the Brompton barracks next door. It was latterly converted to a hotel and has been owned by the same family since 1980. Apart from new carpets I am not sure it has any money spent of furniture or structure since the original purchase. But it was well cared for if though well-worn in places.
We decided to explore the local area and headed out in the car to Gillingham High Street. It was not pleasant and definitely not worth stopping the car and risking it not having 4 wheels on it when we returned. We drove on onto St Mary’s Island which turned out to be just residential. Now I was getting disheartened by Kent and this whole trip.
We decided to head the short distance to Rochester instead and instantly were rewarded by the picturesque version of Kent we had hoped for. Even better I found free parking next to the castle and so with some blue sky overhead we walked up the olde world high street. It was all rather nice on an early Sunday evening. There were many bars, cafes and restaurants open and all doing a good trade.
Many of the pubs were already full of people with the lead up to England’s first game in this years Euro’s. I have not been caught up with the excitement of it all yet and probably won’t until England get to the knock out stages – assuming they do.
The only disappointment on the High Street is that we thought there would be more ‘Dickens’ buildings. It wasn’t until I looked it up afterwards that we found he had lived slightly outside of the centre of Rochester.
Karen was keen to eat whilst we were here. I really wasn’t too hungry so said that whichever establishment she picked would be fine. That caused her into a big dilemma as it meant if she didn’t like what was served up it would be entirely her fault. I would have chosen a local small Italian café but she kept imagining all sorts of possible problems with every possible choice. So, in the end she settled upon a very safe Pizza Express where we both had a salad. Using our vouchers on the apps we managed to get more than 50% off the bill which made it almost reasonable.
Back at the hotel, we watched on the small TV, England hang on for a victory over Serbia. I realised that I would have rather been watching the final round of the US Golf Open but Sky hasn’t reached this hotel just yet.
At least the first impression was that the bed was comfortable as we turned in for the night.
