A SEAT WITH A VIEW IN MARLBOROUGH

When Mr. HCB told me he wasn’t going in the garden this morning, I asked where he would like to go - and he said I could choose - so I chose Marlborough for several reasons.  Firstly, I do like Marlborough and one of my favourite coffee shops, The Food Gallery is there, Secondly, I love the drive to Marlborough, as there are many beautiful trees on the way there and thirdly, it was just good to be going out with Mr. HCB.

We went to The Food Gallery straightaway and enjoyed a lovely cup of coffee, but today no toast or chocolate brownies - that will be a pleasure to look forward to after I reach my target weight!

We sat at a table in the window, although we couldn’t see out because the windows were steamed up - but I spied a beautiful coffee jug on the windowsill and decided that the quote on it was something that we tried to live by - “Laugh often - love much - and live well” so it would be part of my collage for today.  It was only when I lifted it up and thankfully didn’t try holding it by the handle, that I realised that the handle was rather wonky and had been glued to the actual coffee pot!  That could have been difficult, but you know what I’m like for rearranging things!

Anyway, we enjoyed our coffee and then had a wander around Marlborough.  Always good to look in the charity shops there and Mr. HCB was pleased to find a newish hardback book by Peter May - a famous Blipper - that he hadn’t read and it was only £2 so I bought for him and wished him a “Happy Christmas” as I handed it to him, once it was paid for!  Then, in front of the lady in the shop, he said to me “Well, I might have to buy you a new washing machine for Christmas if ours can’t be repaired!”  How cheeky is that? It made her laugh! :-)  The man is coming next Monday to look at the washing machine, so despite it only being 10 years old, if the parts can’t be bought, then it will have to be a new one.  

As we wandered along, we saw this wonderful postbox topper with the words “Traffic Jam”, so another shot in the bag/phone.  There is also some pareidolia there if you are that way inclined.

We sauntered along the High Street and decided to go through Priory Gardens, where we found a seat for Mr. HCB to sit on - and you can see him admiring the beautiful trees - but he didn’t stay on the seat for long, as it was rather wet, so he had a wet btm!

A few more charity shops later saw us making our way home and we decided to go along the top road via Hackpen - the bottom right shot shows the beautiful trees along there where we were also treated to the sight of a couple of Red Kites and also several pheasant.  One pheasant was sitting on a fence post and just as we got near, took off, so although it’s not a brilliant shot, I just liked it.  We did miss hitting it, or I might have told Mr. HCB to stop and pick it up!  

Back home I prepared lunch and we both said how much we had enjoyed the morning - but the day has been quite dreary and dull - with a light drizzle - so it’s good to have mornings like this to “lift our spirits” - however, a little sunshine might be good before the winter finally settles in!