My green credentials took a double hit this morning. In 30 degree heat, i had to put my washing in the dryer as we have no access to any sort of clothes line or even a drying rack. I couldn’t find a cold wash on the front loader either, so my clothes were the temperature of lava when I shifted them into the furnace that was the dryer. Hideous. I’m sure everything will end up the same uniform grey color and two sizes too small. I know kiwi travelers are used to hand washing everything and then draping it on every surface but there is nothing in our flat to put it on, not even seat backs as we have bench seats.
Then, we’d planned to travel up to King’s Lynn on the train, but discovered it was going to be cheaper, cooler, more comfortable, and more convenient if we hired a car. So, we had a lovely afternoon, whizzing around the countryside in our air conditioned bubble. Didn’t think much of the default ratio station that we never got around to changing – Ultra Smooth or something – makes The Breeze seem cool and edgy – and had far more than it’s fair share of Whitney and poor George Michael. I will also note that in spite of what you might think, access to a smart phone and google maps does not necessarily remove all navigator/driver tension. And I’ll just leave that there.
King’s Lynn is a lovely and well preserved old port town that used to be called Bishop’s Lynn until Henry VIII got his hands on it. Luckily it lost it’s prosperity when the trains came along and bypassed it which is why it wasn’t squashed to make something bigger, newer and uglier. It has a Campbell’s soup factory nearby.
We also went to see Castle Rising, which is a castle that hasn’t completely fallen down. In the 12 hundreds, Queen Isabella took up with some charming wide boy whose name escapes me, and together they offed her husband, who was one of the early King Edwards who apparently preferred the company of men. The charmer also came to a bad end fairly speedily, but luckily for Isabella, her son – the new King Edward (where’s the originality, guys?) – was very fond of her and so banished her to the wilds of East Anglia instead of chopping her head off. And they all lived happily ever after. The moral of the story being, try to maintain cordial relations with your offspring.