Kentish long-weekend

After a big weekend of riding the previous week, where I managed to pull a muscle in my knee on the Saturday making Sunday's large singlespeed ride rather painful, it seemed to a good idea to leave the bike(s) at home for the last long weekend of the summer. The physio sorted out my knee quickly, but recommended I do some form of exercise other than biking - a thought that hadn't crossed my mind recently. So I went for a run & pulled a muscle in my foot - I promptly gave up running.

Not taking bikes, meant that the four of us could all fit in the same car as we travelled to a quaint 15th century cottage we had rented for the weekend - our base for a friends' wedding. It's quite fun staying in a house that is more than twice as old as the country you're from. Happily, I also had a long weekend for my birthday for the first time in my life - a rather dismal day weather wise, we pretty much spent the day eating well too much. We also managed to fit a visit to Canterbury Cathedral in (I'd been before with Trish a few years ago, so as the weather was pants I didn't really take many photos).  Eventually we settled on a huge roast dinner and if that didn't fill me up - the two birthday cakes certainly helped.

Plenty of exposed beams

Kings Head Cottage - plenty of room for us all.

Across the village green.

One of the older houses in Chartham.

Thankfully, the wedding day had considerably better weather than my birthday.  Laura & Luis got engaged before I started working here in the UK, so it was good to see all the plans that we've heard so much of come to fruition.  The service was all very traditional (dearly beloved, have & to hold etc.) and quite good fun, I still can't sing very well though.  On seeing the wedding car, below, I immediately had to get a few snaps for Uncle Geoff back in Australia - I'm pretty sure Bentleys of such age are his favourite.

With a bit too much time to spare between ceremony & evening wedding party, we went down to the white cliffs at Dover in our gladrags - where we picniced on the beach, mucked around, went to the pub and then wandered a bit on top of the cliffs.

After the speeches was the dancing for the night - a céilidh.  Basically a gaelic folk dance, it reminded me of the (awful) folk-dancing endured at primary school - but it was miles better due to there being a good band, a caller to tell me what to do and no longer being scared of girl-germs.  But I still had little idea what I was doing - but it really didn't matter as plenty others didn't either.  A huge pig-on-a-spit topped the night off nicely; amusingly the happy couple drove off in a tuk-tuk.