Autumn

The children are all back to school, most of the tourists have gone home, and the season has begun to wind down a little.  The cottages are still fully booked at the moment but I think Jenny is looking forward to a bit of a rest over the next few months after a very busy summer! 

The Isle of Wight Ploughing Match took place last weekend, and much to Jenny and Alistair's delight, Ross (my husband), came top of his class and second overall, out of a total of 57 entries.  You will be able to find some photos of the match on the following website, http://www.matchploughing.co.uk/.  The event is well attended by the local farming community and it was a glorious day.  It is quite a lovely rural scene, with a vast array of tractors ranging from modern, to vintage with trailed ploughs (this is what Ross uses). 

I have been taking quite a few bookings for next year already, so we are hoping that 2011 will be as good as 2010.  The hot tub seems to have been a huge success, although I muct confess that I haven't been in it yet! 

Wave 105 Competition

For anyone who wanted to stay with us over the school summer holidays and was unable to, there is a last chance this week!  We have given a week in Lavender cottage as a prize to Wave 105, to award to a lucky winner!  Have a look on our website for a good idea of what Lavender can offer, http://www.atherfield.co.uk/.

The week in question is the 21st - 28th August and is for a family of four.  All you have to do is go onto the Wave 105 http://www.wave105.com/Article.asp?id=1851136&spid=22878 website or the Island Breaks http://www.islandbreaks.co.uk/site/wave105 site and find the competition form.  You have to watch a video clip and then answer a question, so give it a go! 

Wave 105 came to film us for the prize, a couple of weeks ago and here is the link to the clip which you can find on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ygua0ZN7EAc&feature=player_embedded  - the cottages do look rather lovely and you can see the new hot tub!

Business is brisk and the weather has been absolutely gorgeous so I hope it lasts for the rest of the summer!

Summer time

Well, summer is just about here after the long, cold winter!  The west wight is looking stunning with its wild hedgerows bursting with colour and wildlife, and the crops in the fields beginning to take off.  The tourists are starting to appear and the beach trade is picking up - the ice cream van man has increased his hours! 

This is my favourite time of year!  During the hot spell a couple of weeks ago, we had our first 'beach' trip of the season and the children were brave enough to venture into the sea for a swim - I put my big toe in which was more than enough!!  It's freezing!  We then stayed on the beach during the evening with friends, to have a barbeque, and the beach was buzzing with locals making the most of having it to ourselves - aren't we a selfish lot! 

I often feel that we are the luckiest people alive to have all of this on our doorstep and feel that we have an obligation to make the most of it - hence, quite often, I take the children down to Compton beach for an hour or so after school for a play and swim - this is what childhood should be about!

The cottages are now very busy and Jenny and Alistair are hard at work making sure all our visitors have a wonderful stay.  For those who have been recently, I do hope you had fun in the hot tub!

Where does time go? Since I last wrote, Christmas has been and gone and so has all our SNOW! We can now see green again and the snowdrops, crocuses and daffodils are beginning to show - a sure sign that spring must be on its way, we hope! Jenny and Alistair have been very busy over the last few months, lifting and riddling tonnes of potatoes - not a nice job as you can imagine, particularly in the icy weather. After we watched in envy whilst many places on the mainland had snow, we finally got our wish and had a good helping! Alistair bought a snow blower (a machine that attaches to the tractor and 'blows' the snow out of the way) twenty years ago and this was the first time he has had cause to use it! The island was a beautiful sight to behold from where we went toboganning up on the Downs - absolutely breathtaking and we all had lots of fun, throwing ourselves down steep slopes on bags and bodyboards! Although all the schools and a lot of shops and roads were shut, I believe I know what people spent their time at home doing - booking their holidays and dreaming of the summer ahead! We have had so many positive responses from people regarding our website - thank you! With regard to improvements in the cottages, Jenny and Alistair have invested in flat screen TV's for Rose and Honeysuckle, and Ross (my husband) has been busy installing satellite dishes to try and get a bigger selection of channels for our clients. Just as a boring piece of information, the tv's came with freeview but owing to our isolated position and closeness to France, we are not receiving enough signal to enable us to access it - the powers that be are concerned that it would interfere with French television if they increased power!! Heaven forbid should that happen! We are also able to provide wireless internet access, albeit that at present, this can only be used in Jenny and Alistair's conservatory - work in progress! Other news is that Auntie Kate is having a whale of a time in South Africa at the moment. She is there for three months, experiencing conservation projects, horse riding and working with children. We keep getting texts from her telling us how hot and wonderful it is over there - we can but dream!

I will sign off now, I do hope everyone has survived the cold spell and I have enclosed a snow picture to show the Island in a different light!  This is a view looking towards the sea from the Downs behind Brighstone - Atherfield is away to the left, out of shot.