an english summers day

today we woke up at kev's parents house and ate a delicious fried english breakfast (well, the bacon and sausage were actually grilled) with proper irish potato bread (thanks to kev's dad's latest trip to visit family in ireland). it was delicious! i miss english bacon and sausages so much. what a treat.

then we set off on our little road trip to the cotwolds. i LOVE road trips! we borrowed the car (from kev's parents) and hit the road. the motorways can be pretty boring but i played DJ with the ipod and we sang along and before we knew it we were on the country road heading towards the old market town of stow-on-the-wold where we had planned to stop for lunch. it got me thinking what does 'wold' mean and good old wiki told me my guess of hill was correct. its an old english word used to describe a range of hills consisting of open country overlying limestone or chalk (i'm sure you probably didn't wanna know that but i thought i'd tell you anyway!).

it is a typical old but lovely english town (with a market square, a church, a fish and chip shop, lots of tea rooms and LOADS of pubs!), and it was a very typical english summers day with drizzle and grey grey skies (aahhh, the english summer. i certainly don't miss you).

for lunch we went to the kings arms and i drank a lovely pint of strongbow. it was SO good.

they do sell strongbow in the irish bars in vienna but it doesn't quite taste the same. its just not as crisp and fizzy and cold somehow (but i still drink it obviously!).
my goats cheese and caramelised onion tart with salad leaves was pretty damn good too!

we wandered around in the drizzle and couldn't help notice that the average age of visitors to the town is probably about 73. there were certainly a lot of 'shampoos and sets' around! we also had a chuckle when we saw this sign on the entrance door to a pub.

i didn't want to get too close to the door with my camera for fear of the bar staff seeing me but the sign says 'BARRED. We hereby give notice that Alistair Darling Chancellor of the Exchequer is banned from this pub until further notice'. (i should probably point out that he is now shadow chancellor since the labour party lost the election in may).

before leaving the town and heading to our hotel to check in, kev insisted that we stop and purchase a cake from an amazing looking bakery and tea shop (i do love a good english tea shop).

he chose the vanilla slice and let me try a bite. i have to say, it was THE best vanilla slice i have ever eaten!

and this is how to eat a vanilla slice! (hee hee).