Getting through the rush hour traffic in Northampton wasn't as bad as I thought and soon we were on the A43 and heading towards the M40. It was another gorgeous day with clear blue skies and sunshine but it was quite cold and the temperature didn't really rise about 5c the whole way.
We stopped for coffee at the emptiest and coldest Little Chef I've ever visited and enjoyed a Latte. I had a truly horrendous headache which lasted the entire day and might have been down to the wee dram of whisky I enjoyed before going to bed last night. Not a good idea when I'd been drinking Prosecco!
We arrived at Salisbury Crematorium an hour early so we drove into the city and parked in a foul-smelling car park near the centre. The stairwells smelt of stale urine so it wasn't the best first impression of a place we'd never visited before!
Luckily, as we made our way towards the Cathedral, the city improved and the area around the huge church, called "The Close" was lovely. There were several sculptures by a woman called Sophie Ryder that were huge and very striking.
She seemed to like hares!
We had a walk around and went into the Cathedral cloisters which were beautiful.
We learnt that the cathedral houses the Magna Carta and has four copies. Obviously we didn't have time to go and view it today but I would like to go back one day and spend some more time in the city.
We walked back to the car along with a crowd of teenage boys from the private schools that are very near to the Cathedral. This area was much more pretty than the area close to the car park so we forgave Salisbury and both said it would be good to come back and spend more time exploring.
We arrived at the crematorium with half an hour to spare and met some more of Pat's friends who had arrived to say goodbye. The service was different to any I'd been to before with a lot of music and memories from Pat's life. The music selection was eclectic to say the least and included Duelling Banjos!
After the service we went to Pat and Eleanor's house for a light buffet. My headache was still terrible so I swallowed some Nurofen and hoped fervently that it would go before it was time to drive back home.
Luckily, it abated and we left Salisbury at 3pm. The plan had been to stop in the village of Hinton-in-the-Hedges for a drink but we were there for 5pm which we thought was a bit too early to be stopping for a drink. It took us another hour to reach our village because of the rush hour traffic so we went the pub for a drink and a chat about the day. The kids had curries for their dinner but Keith and I made do with some oven chips and a pizza for our meal. Not really what I had in mind for this evening but never mind!
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