China Girl blog 30th October 2018

As the year moves on there is a sense of time passing, a feeling of serenity settles on the garden.

This week Ma was away with her eldest daughter Arabella and her grand daughter Violet, plus two of Violet’s fifteen year-old friends. They went for two days on a spree to ‘Gay Paree,’ travelling on the Eurostar Express. When they arrived in London the night before taking the train, they discovered that their hotel had been booked for the wrong night! It took many phone calls to find fived beds for the night near the train station.

Arriving in Paris, they set off to an art exhibition, only to find that since they had not booked, they were unable to get in. After having got lost on the metro, the girls discovered their mobile phones had been pick-pocketed. After two hours in the police station, the phones were located, having slipped out of a pocket as they went through customs. They then visited the outside of the Louvre for a photo, then went on some much-needed retail therapy. Later they all had a jolly evening sailing down the Seine.

Next day was spent shopping and window shopping in the Rue de Rivoli, by which time Ma was exhausted, only being revived by a glass of Pernod when they passed a café! Twenty-four hours in Paris is not enough, but was quite enough for Mother.

When they arrived at the station to catch the train back to London, Arabella discovered she had lost her passport; happily she remembered it was still at the police station. The thought of leaving Arabella in Paris and being in charge of three teenagers made Ma apoplectic!

What else could go wrong? Except when Dearest arrived in Tiverton, the station was closed and there were no taxis left. She spent the next day in bed!

Meanwhile, Team Cothay were ever-busy as two frosts had arrived. After three days away, Ma felt that the garden was a miracle, and she felt she was walking on sunshine.