Cambridge was a complete washout – we didn’t even bother going into town, so no pics from there.

Our campsite was at Bourton-on-the-Water, a very popular village, as you can see:-)

It’s strange the way you don’t see yourself as others see you. I just thought, oh, I’ll take a snap of these old folk resting on a bench, without ever thinking that I’m one of them.

You can get it without people, but you have to be there very early. This was taken at 6.14am.

We’ve all heard about crop circles. This is a weed circle!

The weather has not been great, only three days when it was too warm for jeans. Lots of Photoshop has been required.

It took us ages to get to this village as we had to follow this group of riders down a narrow road. They redeemed themselves by looking good in this photo. We went to the Fairford Military Air Tattoo on Sunday. Really enjoyed it, didn’t think I would be able to stand for eight hours, (yes, 8) watching air displays but it passed really quickly. We may go again next year! The Red Arrows were the stars of the show, they are truly outstanding, much better than the French and Spanish teams who were also there. They all did this, but the Red Arrows seemed to do it faster. Here they are flying in formation with the last Vulcan bomber still flying, in its last year of flying. One of the interesting things about the Vulcan was that its first flight was only 11 years after the first flight of the Lancaster bomber (Google if you don’t know what a Lancaster looks like). Next year it will go on display at the Finningley Air Museum, Doncaster, Yorkshire, which sounds like a good day out for young Sebastian. There was also a really good Battle of Britain tribute. I don’t like the way Britain seems to be always harping on about the war, but it was great to see the Spitfires etc flying, they even had a Messerschmitt 109!

Cheltenham was another town that was nowhere near as interesting as I thought it would be. There were a lot of very expensive cars around though.

Some of these towns are so beset with cars we didn’t even get the cameras out. What would you do, save the town by building a bypass, or leave the countryside alone?

It’s a good thing the National Trust owns so many of the best bits, and saves them from ruination by developers.

When we lived in the Midlands, I think you girls all went on school trips to Chedworth Roman Villa. I know, it was boring, but you might like it now – they have dug a lot more of it out. They still do school trips – here the kids are all dressed in Roman tunics. This is a hypocaust, or heating system. I love the way this old technology is easy to understand.The heat comes in through that hole in the wall, from the furnace room next door, and heats the stone pillars. The pillars support the stone floor, and there is your under floor heating. Brilliant! Children are sent in under the floor to clean out the ashes – presumably when it’s cooled down. And you used to moan about loading the dishwasher:-) Apparently the Romans somehow knew that keeping clean was healthy.   Also owned by the National Trust, so just phone photos. We are now at Malvern. Tomorrow we are going to see Colin’s cousin Heather, who got in touch with us through Facebook. He hasn’t seen her for 25 years.