Day 2, June 10th 2014

Morning dawned on a new day as we were still in flight.  Rhys roused himself as they brought our continental breakfast.  He ate the grapes and the croissant and sucked down two glasses of orange juice.  We landed at about 1000 UK time.

The mythical Terminal 5.  The object of our first quest in England.

There was a very long walk to customs, which was nice after the long flight.  We arrived at customs and queued up, getting there at a fortuitous time as it turned up.  We got in line just before another full flight arrived from New York. We were about forty people ahead of the little girl who got sick and started vomiting.  This lead to an interesting study in different personalities.  The girl's mother didn't tell anyone about the mess and tried to get through customs.  Another woman was desperately interested in everyone knowing that the little girl had thrown up, that little girl right there.  Look at her horrible mother for not telling anyone.

Customs went very smoothly, except that I did not have the address for our lodgings since Tracy had it.  The customs lady hassled me a bit but when I agreed with her that, yes, indeed I should have a copy as well she passed us through.  Our bags were waiting for us, we grabbed them both, and off we went to meet Nana and Grandad.

Oh no, not so fast.  The adventures continued.  We were in terminal 2.  They were supposed to be waiting right outside the doors with all of the gentlemen holding signs with names on them.  There was no sign of them at all.  We had no way to contact them.  Hmmmm.  An adventure to start our new day.

My phone doesn't work here, but it still has the emails I downloaded from before we left.  I went through the ones from Nana and found one where she said they would be waiting at terminal five for us.  Rhys and I found a bathroom and started off through the airport to get to terminal five.  Elevators, moving walkways, trains, we did it all.  Forty minutes later we arrived at terminal five, and there was Grandad, standing at the line as promised.

Through it all Rhys was getting froggy, though he was very cheerful.  I vaguely remembered grabbing his meds and sticking them in one of our bags so I dug around and finally found them.  While Nana and Grandad booked the van I got them down his gullet, vastly increasing his chances of surviving the day.

We all headed off to get the car.  While Grandad and I were checking it out Nana showed Rhys were the bathroom was.  I brought the car around and Rhys and loaded the baggage.  Nana told me that she had taken Rhys to the bathroom so I asked him to show it to me.  He led me into the building and showed me where it was, ending with "Can you find your way back?"

Grandad was driving with Nana navigating.  Rhys and I climbed into the back of the car and didn't even make it out of London.  I woke up every little while, peered out the window and then went back to sleep.  Rhys didn't twitch.  Knowing that we needed food Grandad took us to McDonalds, which is all that was available on the Motorway.  Rhys enjoyed that.

As we got near to Exeter we realized that we didn't actually know where we were going.  I borrowed the map from Nana and looked in the general area of where the farm was.  I vaguely remembered the town of Stoke Canon.  I left it to Nana and Grandad to get us there.  We circled madly through Exeter, which is a difficult town to get through it turns out.  Finally, in despair, Nana threw down the map, I pulled out Grandad's compass and said "It's North.  That way!"  and off we went.

Miraculously we popped out of a small country lane in Stoke Canon.  This is a typical little English village, including a stone bridge that is only one lane wide.  As we started across we were faced with a line of cars coming towards us.  Grandad backed up, the van started beeping madly, I looked back, no car.  Grandad looked back, no car.  I looked the other way and we were about to hit the bridge.  "Stop!" yelled I.  "Crunch!" said the car.  "Shit!" said the Grandad.

We stopped at the local Royal Mail/convenience store and asked for directions to Bussels Farm.  It was right down the road, only a mile away.  We followed the directions, only getting lost once in the first 200 yards.  The final bit of road is one lane wide with ten foot banks and hedges on each side.  In that final half mile we passed a tractor, a van, a lorry and two cars.  Happily there were wide sections where we could pull in to let them pass.  We only had to back up to one of them once.

We are in the building on the right.  Left side.

Upon arrival at Bussel's Farm there was a sign on the door of the office telling us that our cottage was unlocked and that Tracy had emailed and she would be taking the train into Exeter then getting a cab to the farm.  It was about 1700 when we arrived, so Tracy and Owyn were still three hours from landing.  The first thing Rhys noticed was the pool.  "Daddy!"  "They have a pool!"  "Can I go in it?".  "Not today, it's too cold".  "You can go in before we leave."

Grandad and I went back into town, to the store, and picked up enough groceries for dinner and breakfast.  Dinner was Gin and tonics, wine and spaghetti, with a salad.  Grandad whipped up some oil and balsamic vinegar dressing with a little mustard powder and some pepper.  Rhys loved it.

After dinner Rhys and I explored the farm a bit, then he went off to bed.  I told him he could sleep with me the first night since Mama wasn't going to be there.  I stayed up chatting with Nana and Grandad but by 2000 I was done and hit the rack.  I slept like the dead until 0510 when Tracy and Owyn walked into the room, several hours ahead of schedule, but that's a tale for another post...