Due South - 26th March 2012

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Off to France tomorrow! 3 days wandering down with the van, 11 days in JZ’s house near Anduze then a week making our way back probably via the Pyrenees and the Dordogne. Jim will be with us for the first half then catching the train home to get back to college. We are taking the bikes but not sure which ones yet. Jim is collecting his new road bike today but the mountain biking down there should be good so which to take?

Let’s hope the weather is as good as it has been here. Ann and Alan came up for the weekend and we had a picnic in Nidderdale high up on the tops. On the way we stopped for tea at How Stean Gorge which has done a lot of work remaking itself as an adventure centre with abseiling, potholing and a via ferrata. If you know the gorge its not exactly the Grand Canyon so everything is on a scale that would be great for Tommy and Robby or even Emily and Ben if they come up.


A & A came up to see Nanci Griffith at the refurbished Barbican theatre. Great show, she is looking a bit frail but the voice is as good as ever. Lots of old favourites - Radio, Trouble in the fields and From a Distance (still can't see why this has been adopted by Christians like Cliff Richard as the lyrics are actually quite ambiguous - take a listen, am I right?) and a great new anthem for the Occupy movement Hell No!

Margot was off for a re-union of the World Studies Trust . Met lots of old friends but managed (surprise, surprise) to come away with new work to do. So yesterday I went with Ann and Alan to see the Miro exhibition at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Not that impressed. I would like them one at a time in the right location but this was overload. Never mind, another lovely day and we had a picnic in the country park before A&A headed south and I went back to Wakefield to finish off Jim’s house.

The house is now on the market. Much of this month has been spent painting and cleaning and it looks pretty good but the market is still slack so even if they get the asking price it will be sold at a loss. Jeff and Debbie came up and helped last weekend which must have been difficult it being Mother's day, but we cleared out all the remaining possessions, much of which is now sitting in my garage.

Jim is now settled in to his new flat which is just around the corner from us so we see a lot of him, which is nice. He is getting into triathlon (hence the new bike) and we do regular along the river bank. Matt is also running, in Manchester, and looks likely to be faster than either of us. The lads wanted to start a book on who would  get the best time but I declined, a bit like turkey's voting for Christmas. Two months and we all start the 10k season in Hull. Jim is also getting into squash and comes along to the Railway Institute where I play but for the time being I can still beat him, thanks to animal cunning.

Apart from that, this month has been dominated by my essay for the Lifelong Learning classs. Entitled “The role of intelligence tests in the development of the theory of intelligence” it has really got me interested. I’m glad to have finished the essay which had to be cut down from about 10,000 words to 2,000 but I’ll be going back to re-reading some of the books that I only skimmed through. Fascinating stuff but difficult to understand if only because each author invents their own terminology, something to do with justifying a book deal I think. I also signed up for the next module, Social Psychology. I had intended to give myself a break over the summer but have got the bug. Keeps the old brain on its toes.

Before we head south tomorrow I’ve got a meeting with Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust, trying to get some money out of them for the longer term management of the cycle path that goes through their new village at Oswaldbeck. Greenway Champions are busy on part of the track but there is a lot more we could do if we had the resources. In the meantime we have erected interpretation boards to let passers by know what we are up to. Lets hope they don’t get ‘tagged’ or defaced as we are really pleased with it. Its on the website. York Greenway Champions