So our three day sojourn in Eastbourne came to an end all too soon. The weather was remarkable. Whilst the rest of the country suffered frost, snow and freezing temperatures the self styled Sunshine Coast enjoyed unbroken sunshine on our first two days with bright blue skies and temperatures of about 16 degrees. On the third day it needed to change its name to the Rather Dull and Cold Coast.
Eastbourne remains one of our favourite places and we are glad our eldest son has settled there. Just go out of town towards Beachy Head and there is some of the most beautiful countryside in all of the United Kingdom with broad sweeping vistas linking the cliffs, the sea, the Sussex Downs and vast expanses of beautiful countryside and walks. On a bright sunny day it is about as good as it gets.
From Eastbourne it's quite a steep but very rewarding walk to Beachy Head. We also had a drive and got very close to the fabled Long Man of Wilmington. The Long Man is 69 metres in length. It is likely the figure only goes back to the 16th or 17th century which isn't a particularly long while in the history of our country. In 1873 the figure was outlined in yellow brick in order to save it for posterity. It was well worth the walk to view.
One of our favourite places in East Sussex is the small and hugely picturesque village of East Dean - a short drive from Eastbourne. A village green is enclosed by a delicatessen, tea rooms and a pub and the cottages are very photogenic. Every time we visit I take my camera! On this visit the weekly market was in full swing with any number of interesting stalls selling food, drink and even miniature wooden wheelbarrows, one of which we bought for flowers for the garden.
Looking at leaflets and newsletters, East Dean looks like a wonderfully active community - something that really should be celebrated. You may have gathered that I am very keen on people becoming involved in their local communities. We stopped off at the village hall and sat outside enjoying coffee and tea cakes. As it was mid morning there were quite a number of elderly people enjoying the sunshine. Why do elderly people's main topic of conversation often revolve around the subject of illness?
Four people on the table next to us spent the entire time talking about ailments. It's almost as if it's a badge of honour as to whom has the most illnesses.
One of East Dean's claims to fame is an intriguing one. A blue plaque on the outside wall of one of the cottages claims it to be the retirement home of Sherlock Holmes. The inscription on the wall of the cottage (pictured above) states - "Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective and Bee Keeper retired here 1903-1917." Apparently in his preface to the story “His Last Bow,” published in 1917, Dr Watson tells readers that Holmes chose as his retirement retreat “a small farm upon the Downs, five miles from Eastbourne . . .”.
This is a brilliant example of fact and fiction inter-twining. I always remember visiting Romeo and Juliet's balcony in Verona where tourists leave thousands of messages every year. Of course the place is entirely fictitious but I bet as many people believe it is real as believe that Sherlock Holmes was a real detective (and of course he was).
Very close to East Dean (not surprisingly) is West Dean where we had a look at a holiday cottage with a view to renting it later in the year. This village, however, didn't seem anywhere near as welcoming to visitors. No parking signs seemed to be everywhere. There did appear to be some lovely walks which we will investigate. West Dean Church is pictured above. I am sure I will write more about the Deans and Sussex in future months.
Finally today onto the subject of cricket. Yes England look to be in a strong position to win the test match against Sri Lanka after four consecutive defeats. Managed to catch some of the play including Tony Grieg being a bit of a prat.
Grieg was talking to Nick Knight about how people seemed surprised to find that he lives in South Africa. He pointed out that he was born and brought up in South Africa. When Knight asked him what nationality he viewed himself as belonging to he had no hesitation: "I'm South African." Funny how he never mentioned all that in the days when he was captaining the England team. Guess it might have made him a tad unpopular!
Football is currently still deciding on whether to include technology to decide on certain aspects of the game such as whether the ball goes over the line. Cricket has fully embraced technology but, although most fans agree that it is a good thing, it is already becoming slightly controversial in its own right. That is primarily because often the interpretation of technology is still left to the human eye (obviously it can't be any other way). Cricket is a game of minuscule margins - would the ball have hit the stumps if it hadn't hit the batsman's pads first or did the ball hit the bat or pad before being caught.
So we had a couple of incidents in the current test match where a Sri Lanka batsman was given out despite there being inconclusive evidence that the ball hit the bat. Then another Sri Lankan batsman was given not out when there was conclusive technological proof that the ball would have hit the stumps after hitting his pads.
Sri Lanka had appealed the umpire's decision would have been upheld, but as he gave not out and there was some doubt that decision was upheld.
For me the most farcical point of the match so far was Kevin Pietersen (who may be English or South African depending on how he sees things - a bit the same as Andrew Strauss, Matt Prior and Joanathan Trott who were all born in South Africa) was warned by the umpires for continually switch hitting. That means he reversed his shot by changing his hands and hitting as a left hander rather than in his usual way as a right hander. He was given an official warning which meant that if he repeated it he would be docked five runs. Since when have umpires had toe right to decide how a batsman hits the ball or indeed how he holds the bat? I personally would outlaw the stroke but only from a coaching point of view as it is difficult to execute and often leads to the batsmen almost throwing away their wicket. I can't see how the rules of cricket can enforce directions on how to hold the bat and what shots to make.
Will be back with more tomorrow.
Eastbourne remains one of our favourite places and we are glad our eldest son has settled there. Just go out of town towards Beachy Head and there is some of the most beautiful countryside in all of the United Kingdom with broad sweeping vistas linking the cliffs, the sea, the Sussex Downs and vast expanses of beautiful countryside and walks. On a bright sunny day it is about as good as it gets.
From Eastbourne it's quite a steep but very rewarding walk to Beachy Head. We also had a drive and got very close to the fabled Long Man of Wilmington. The Long Man is 69 metres in length. It is likely the figure only goes back to the 16th or 17th century which isn't a particularly long while in the history of our country. In 1873 the figure was outlined in yellow brick in order to save it for posterity. It was well worth the walk to view.
One of our favourite places in East Sussex is the small and hugely picturesque village of East Dean - a short drive from Eastbourne. A village green is enclosed by a delicatessen, tea rooms and a pub and the cottages are very photogenic. Every time we visit I take my camera! On this visit the weekly market was in full swing with any number of interesting stalls selling food, drink and even miniature wooden wheelbarrows, one of which we bought for flowers for the garden.
Looking at leaflets and newsletters, East Dean looks like a wonderfully active community - something that really should be celebrated. You may have gathered that I am very keen on people becoming involved in their local communities. We stopped off at the village hall and sat outside enjoying coffee and tea cakes. As it was mid morning there were quite a number of elderly people enjoying the sunshine. Why do elderly people's main topic of conversation often revolve around the subject of illness?
Four people on the table next to us spent the entire time talking about ailments. It's almost as if it's a badge of honour as to whom has the most illnesses.
This is a brilliant example of fact and fiction inter-twining. I always remember visiting Romeo and Juliet's balcony in Verona where tourists leave thousands of messages every year. Of course the place is entirely fictitious but I bet as many people believe it is real as believe that Sherlock Holmes was a real detective (and of course he was).
Very close to East Dean (not surprisingly) is West Dean where we had a look at a holiday cottage with a view to renting it later in the year. This village, however, didn't seem anywhere near as welcoming to visitors. No parking signs seemed to be everywhere. There did appear to be some lovely walks which we will investigate. West Dean Church is pictured above. I am sure I will write more about the Deans and Sussex in future months.
Finally today onto the subject of cricket. Yes England look to be in a strong position to win the test match against Sri Lanka after four consecutive defeats. Managed to catch some of the play including Tony Grieg being a bit of a prat.
Grieg was talking to Nick Knight about how people seemed surprised to find that he lives in South Africa. He pointed out that he was born and brought up in South Africa. When Knight asked him what nationality he viewed himself as belonging to he had no hesitation: "I'm South African." Funny how he never mentioned all that in the days when he was captaining the England team. Guess it might have made him a tad unpopular!
Football is currently still deciding on whether to include technology to decide on certain aspects of the game such as whether the ball goes over the line. Cricket has fully embraced technology but, although most fans agree that it is a good thing, it is already becoming slightly controversial in its own right. That is primarily because often the interpretation of technology is still left to the human eye (obviously it can't be any other way). Cricket is a game of minuscule margins - would the ball have hit the stumps if it hadn't hit the batsman's pads first or did the ball hit the bat or pad before being caught.
So we had a couple of incidents in the current test match where a Sri Lanka batsman was given out despite there being inconclusive evidence that the ball hit the bat. Then another Sri Lankan batsman was given not out when there was conclusive technological proof that the ball would have hit the stumps after hitting his pads.
Sri Lanka had appealed the umpire's decision would have been upheld, but as he gave not out and there was some doubt that decision was upheld.
For me the most farcical point of the match so far was Kevin Pietersen (who may be English or South African depending on how he sees things - a bit the same as Andrew Strauss, Matt Prior and Joanathan Trott who were all born in South Africa) was warned by the umpires for continually switch hitting. That means he reversed his shot by changing his hands and hitting as a left hander rather than in his usual way as a right hander. He was given an official warning which meant that if he repeated it he would be docked five runs. Since when have umpires had toe right to decide how a batsman hits the ball or indeed how he holds the bat? I personally would outlaw the stroke but only from a coaching point of view as it is difficult to execute and often leads to the batsmen almost throwing away their wicket. I can't see how the rules of cricket can enforce directions on how to hold the bat and what shots to make.
Will be back with more tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment