New Year in Ampthill

My sister and her husband live in Ampthill – possibly the prettiest town in Bedfordshire, and perhaps even in England (according to “The Mick and Jane Classification System”). They have lived there for quite some time, and Mick and I have visited them several times, the last time being for my brother-in-law’s 70th birthday party.

Mick and I had a few days ‘spare’ between the conclusion of our Bristol house sit, until the start of our next one in Cardiff, and with an offer to spend New Year with family we could not resist. It was so much cheaper (and miles more convenient) for us to hire a car for two days and drive to Ampthill rather than for us to use public transport.

So, we picked up our car just before midday and headed off. Sadly there was no GPS in the car, and my rough notes, made from a suggested route by Google Maps before we left Bristol, did not ‘cut the mustard’. We got a little lost!!

Screen Shot 2020-01-01 at 10.12.29 am But we made it safely to our accommodation just before 3.30pm on New Year’s Eve.

Our son and his girlfriend also travelled from their home to join the festivities.

My sister is a wonderful entertainer – she loves Christmas with all the trimmings, and she loves all things ‘family’. So it was no surprise that when we turned up she had prepared a feast for us all – ten in total.

What I absolutely loved was a piece of her Christmas cake – made from our mum’s recipe – and it looked and tasted exactly the same.

And in fact, I had to have more than one piece just to check she had made it correctly.

Then came the dessert – chocolate mouse layered with profiteroles.

Our brother had arrive from Australia two days earlier, and he was there in fine form, as was my sister and my brother-in-law’s son and his family. It was a long lunch with lots of stories, and we were surprised to find out if was after 5pm (and dark outside) when we said farewell.