Sunday April 5th 2009

It is Sunday, and that of course can mean only one thing. Kathleen must go to church. One of our little rituals, but no matter where we have travelled Kathleen has always managed to attend Mass on a Sunday. Today is easy, we already know where the church is, since we have been here several times before, so we leave the van on the Drive, and walk the 15 minutes or so to the church, since the weather is still pleasant and warm. As usual I amuse myself by buying a Sunday paper and reading it whilst Kathleen attends Church.

Church over, we return to Gary & Susana’s place, ensure that all is locked up, and head off around the southern part of the M25 towards our next stop, my brother Brian’s at Rainham, Kent. Again the M25 is behaving itself, this must be a record, and have a trouble free journey to arrive at Brian and Linda’s house to the usual warm welcome.

Brian has expressed an interest in buying a Campervan, so we negotiate the narrow and (it has to be said) bumpy!, private road to their house, where we manoeuvre the van onto the drive just to prove it will be possible for him to park a campervan there. One of his neighbours (opposite) has kindly made a wide tarmac area opposite to Brian’s drive which makes to whole task much easier than it might otherwise have been.

After this excitement, we are driven to Chatham by Brian, and the four of us, have a pleasant walk around the area which was once the Royal Dockyard, but which has now been reclaimed and has a pleasant marina type development with associated walking and cycling trails. Mindful of what happened last time Linda rode a bike (she gave birth to twins), we wisely opt to use only the walking trails!

Back at chez Reay, we are treated to an excellent Sunday lunch and the company of the three Reay girls (Rebecca, Victoria and Michaela). We see them only infrequently and as usual it is a surprise to find how they have grown.

We linger a while into the evening sharing the usual family talk, before leaving to head along the M2 toward Dover where our Sea France ferry is due to leave at 3AM Monday morning. The weather has now deteriorated and we have thick fog. Despite the fog we arrive in plenty of time as intended. Our plan is one of two possibilities, either by arriving early we will be put on an earlier ferry, or we will be able to bed down on the Quayside at Dover and have a nap before catching the ferry (the advantages of a campervan). In the event the fog has caused some delays to the ferry services and at 11-00pm we are put on the delayed 10-00pm sailing. So the adventure begins