Amazonia and Galapagos

This the Manatee Amazon Explorer on the Napo River in the Amazonian Rain Forest, Ecuador, where we spent five days and nights journeying down the river exploring the jungle. It is a flat bottomed boat that can accommodate thirty people but there were just seven of us from the UK sharing the experiences. It may be called a rain forest but it was jungle; steaming, humid and mysterious. Life on the Manatee was gorgeous, delightful crew and delicious home cooked food with a sun deck and a barman who knew how to make cocktails. The cabins were small but perfect with air conditioning and comfy beds.

This is the view from our cabin door. Told you it was jungle.

This is a Caiman at night. To me this is a huge Crocodile though technically it's an Alligator. We were in a small motorised canoe exploring the river banks. I should tell you now that I can't swim and deep water and small boats frighten me. Keep this information in your head as I tell you all I could imagine was this large animal with big teeth and huge eyes  making one lurch towards our small canoe and tipping us over. At the same time Bats as big as seagulls were swooping past our heads scooping up the zillions of insects for their late night feast. Glow-worms lined the banks in their thousands twinkling like fairy lights.

The young man on the left was our canoe driver. I did wonder if our holiday insurance covered us for being driven in dangerous circumstances by a ten year old. Earlier in the day we went to The Piranha Lake and saw Pink River Dolphins but then invited to swim in the lake -the lake full of Piranhas. They eat you. But only if you have an open wound. So glad I had an excuse not to go in and even if I could swim I could never get into a lake full of fishes that eat you.

Ooh look. He's looking at me. Twice a day, early morning after breakfast and then after lunch we'd disembark and get in small canoes, travel to the river banks and explore with our guide, seeing monkeys, birds, tapirs, native villages. No place for glamour here as we wore heavy wellies, rubber capes and life jackets because it isn't called a rain forest for nothing and downpours and storms can roll in at any time. Hence the steaming humidity.

 By contrast this is our luxury boat, the M/V Galapagos Explorer, where we stayed for five days and nights as it cruised The Galapagos Islands. This boat accommodates one hundred passengers in luxurious cabins as big as hotel rooms. Again, twice a day we disembarked after breakfast and after lunch with experienced naturalists for shore expeditions to seek out wildlife and understand the natural history of these volcanic islands. The biggest impact walking around the islands is how the wildlife take no notice of humans as they have no fear of them. So we were able to step over Iguanas as they lay basking, get close enough to seals to gaze into their liquid eyes, exotic birds stayed where they were so we could see their beauty.

A view of the islands and a pretty beach where others snorkelled and swam in 24 degree warm sea. For those who love the water there were opportunities to swim and to snorkel every day as motorised dingies took them out into deep water. One morning as we were disembarking for our morning trip on the dingy to the shore I was standing on the deck looking down and saw a family of six reef sharks circling the dingy. Circling the dingy that I was supposed to be boarding. I couldn't do it. I couldn't climb down the steps and into the dingy, the dingy that bobs up and down, with sharks within touching distance.

 A Pelican Preening.

There Be Dragons. The Iguanas have evolved to take on the colours of their habitats as all the islands vary in foliage, lava rocks, sand so they are all different. The Iguanas on the islands that are mainly black lava rock are black and indistinguishable from their surroundings. This one lives on a sandy island and blended in with the sand and the sea.

This trip was nine air flights , international and internal, two cruises and three nights spent in two cities in Ecuador. Two nights were spent in Quito the capital of Ecuador over 9000 feet above sea level and very near an active volcano in the Andes. Such a pretty city and great to explore. One night was spent in the city of Guayaquil the main port and a delightful surprise as it has a beautiful river waterfront and many small parks with City Iguanas. They had adapted themselves to blend with the urban surroundings and had long tails of green and brown stripes and mottled bodies so as they ran up the trees in the parks they were invisible. They were more twitchy than their cousins in The Galapagos and shied away from humans - typical city life eh?

This was the most adventurous holiday I have ever experienced. I am proud that I'm not as scared as I was of small boats and deep water be it a river or the ocean. Just as well because I estimate I got on and off small canoes and dingies around thirty times.

It was good to meet lots of young people backpacking their way through South America taking Gap Years from education or in-between jobs, couples making that one last trip before they settled down to make a baby. It was good to travel with people of similar ages to us who never had the means to do such things when they were very young - like us. It was good to meet so many nationalities in the Galapagos, Finnish, Russians, Americans, Swiss; Everyone eager to seek and to see and discover the world.

Jack's Dinner

My youngest grandson loves food. Eating it and cooking it. He cooked these fresh mackerel, asparagus salad and crushed new potatoes for dinner this week. Jack has a natural flair for cooking and a good palate although he insists he doesn't want to be a Chef de Cuisine.

Balkan Food Market

We've just returned from our travels through The Baltic Countries beginning with Sweden, moving on to Finland, then Russia, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Germany and finishing in Denmark. All this achieved cruising on The Clipper Adventurer, a small cruise ship with just over one hundred passengers, a wonderful crew, delicious food and The Baltic Sea and The Gulf of Finland as calm as a duck pond all of the way. I ate fresh fish every day and above is a small example of the foods sold in a local food market - but I can't remember which country we were in when I took the photos!

Most of the time I was caught up emotionally with the people in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia as the local guides proudly showed us their towns and cities and talked gently of The Troubled Times leading up to 1991 and their eventual freedom. Freedom from the Nazis to the left of them and the Russians to the right of them. Centuries of occupation, invasion and they are at last free. I kept imagining if this had been us here in the UK and simply how lucky we all are as no matter how we feel about our governments we have no idea how it was for the people of these countries. They are rebuilding their beautiful cities and they welcome visitors like us with great charm and speak our language perfectly.

We were in Finland and a pompous Git in our very privileged group asked the Finnish guide if they 'had a lot of trouble from the Eastern Europeans coming into their country and taking their jobs' I held my breath waiting for her reply and she answered

'We have many Estonians coming here to work and they are excellent carpenters so when they arrive they start up their own carpentry businesses and are a great asset to us and our economy'

That shut him up.

Summer Moules

Lovely dish of mussels and the fattest chips and mayo eaten sitting in the afternoon sunshine in The Bull Hotel courtyard. Although next time I order them I'll ask for them cooked with no cream. I prefer them Mariniere -simply white wine, garlic and parsley so I can drink the liquer like a soup and dunk my bread. I was left with a bowl of cream - undrinkable.

High Peak Food

I had these scallops in a local Dorset eating place. They were horrid. Smelt fishy, not in a good way, and had been microwaved to the point where the edges had gone hard and crusty.

The scallops below were eaten in another local hostelry, very small and shrivelled, and I had no leaves or bread to mop up the garlic butter so I had to ask for some. 

 
We were in The High Peak this weekend. So of course we ate a lot. The above is yet another variation on the ubiquitous scallop. These were some of the best I've eaten lately, resting on some very lush, moist black pudding. I'm giving up on scallops until an imaginitive chef comes up with something new. How about deep fried in a tempura batter? Why not?

These two photos are of our Roast Sunday Lunch in The Fallow Deer in Chapel en-le-Frith, Derbyshire. Yes-two massive Yorkshire Puddings. That's gravy in the brown jug. The vegetables were fresh and lightly steamed, the roast beef was good. This plate of food is far more hearty than most Sunday lunches where I live and only cost £7.95. Locally some places charge almost twice that. Of course we couldn't eat both Yorkies but most plates were going back to the kitchen empty so plenty of diners managed to eat them. Or maybe they gave them to a friend.

On cooking. With all these baby leaves being presented as a garnish on many dishes and they are so very small why not go back to mustard and cress?

Trains and Boats and Planes

We've just returned from our wonderful journey travelling through Namibia. Three thousand miles, not including the Virgin Flight from Heathrow and back, on planes and boats and trains and of course a coach. Namibia is a huge country, the size of Germany and France joined together and a population of around two million people. So I thought I'd begin with the obvious. Me in the Namib desert watching several very fit Safari Guides getting all the doings out of their 4x4 to set up a table on top of a sand dune ready to serve us very large Gin and Tonics in icy cold pewter goblets and a buffet as we watched the magnificent sunset over the beautiful desert.

It has to be food first. Mostly we ate animals we'd seen in the bush but this meal was all fish. We stayed overnight in Luderitz at the Nest Hotel on Namibia's Atlantic coast, named The Skeleton Coast because as the storms blew ships onto the rocks and the sailors thought they'd reached safety on land, they soon discovered there was nothing but desert ahead of them and they died in the intense heat and starved of water. Their skeletons are still being found.


The above is a mixed seafood main course for one person. If we'd known how huge it was going to be we'd have ordered two between the four of us and not one each.

We stayed in five star hotels, desert lodges, bush rest camps and I sat on a scorpion. We journeyed for four days through the desert on The Namibian Desert Express Train. It never went faster than forty miles an hour. The bathrooms were very tiny. I was horrified when I sat on the lavvy and discovered a full length mirror facing me on the closed door. It was almost touching my nose so I multi-tasked and plucked my eyebrows at the same time.

Namibia is a brilliant destination. More to come.

Fish in a Bag at Jamie's Italian

Jamie's Fish in a Bag served to us in Jamie's Italian in Bath. I took loads more photos of our delicious meal but the battery was flattening so this is the only image that showed up properly.

His food just gets better and betterer. I ate a perfect Frito Misto with good bread but unless you were there and ate it or I could show you how good it looked as well as tasted there's no words.

But if you get the chance to eat at one of his Italian restaurants then take it. The prices won't hurt your pocket either. Great value, such a relaxing atmosphere and always very charming servers, well trained, polite and seemingley very happy as if they are enjoying their work.

How To Cook The Perfect Christmas Dinner!

How To Cook The Perfect Christmas Dinner!

1. Don’t.
2. If you have to, remain sober.
3. Not sober? Don’t be over ambitious.
4. Check size of turkey in relation to size of your oven.
5. Only invite guests that drink too, then they won’t notice the state you’re in.
6. Lower the lights so they can’t see the cat’s hairs in the first course.
7. Pour plenty of wine in the gravy to camouflage alien flavours.
8. Try to eat something yourself to soak up the alcohol intake in your blood.
9. Wear waterproof mascara for the inevitable moment when you cry/sweat.
10. Don’t ever get talked into doing it again.

My then still comparatively new man is assuming that because I ran a restaurant I could cook, and on the strength of this invited six good friends to Christmas day lunch. My cottage is small, and my kitchen is a galley.

They, including man looking smug and proud, are sitting round the dining table in the glow of myrrh-scented candles (No: 6). Their glasses are permanently being topped up, and they are feeding from a large oval dish of crudités and dips while I cook the first course. I have a very large copper pan full of mixed seafood being sautéed in butter, olive oil, garlic and herbs for the Italian style ‘Frito Misto’ I am ambitiously preparing. (No: 3) I give the heavy pan a chef like swirl over the heat, and amazingly, the entire contents of prawns, scallops, mussels and squid, take on a life of their own, and spiral into the air, hang suspended and dump themselves over the kitchen floor and into the cat’s dish!

I look furtively at my guests from the open plan galley. They’re laughing, drinking (No: 5) and talking merrily! Haven’t apparently seen a thing! I scoop everything up, from under the edge of fridges, washing machine and yes, the cat’s dish and throw it back into the pan, add fresh lemon juice, more black pepper, pray and serve it up in a large dish
for them to shell and pick at and dunk their crusty bread into the hot, garlic butter. I am saved. I sit and join in, but I can’t bring myself to eat (No: 8), so partake of a little more wine. (No: 2)

My oven is too small to take a turkey adequate enough for eight diners (No: 4). I am cooking three plump whole boned turkey breasts. They have been roasted, basted in butter and ready to ‘rest’ out of the oven to continue cooking in their own heat, while I make my gravy. I like gravy. I like rich, slightly thickened gravy, not much of a ‘jus’ person.

The saucepan has all the delicious roasting juices from the turkey breasts and I’m whisking in my flour, making a roux. I gently add my homemade chicken stock, stirring continually, watching it satisfyingly thicken. I reach over for my old fashioned Gravy Browning, pour, and stare in disbelief at the Fairy Liquid bottle in my left hand and the green globule slowly dissolving into my pan full of rich gravy! I panic! I slurp! I honestly think for one moment I am able to scoop the offending green Fairy Liquid out of the pan with a slotted spoon, add lashings of wine and get away with it! (No: 7)

I tip the gravy down the sink. I look at the residue in the roasting pan where the breasts are resting, but I’ve used it all. I have to resort to a chicken stock cube, cornflour and this time, the Gravy Browning, and not the Fairy. I am dripping, with perspiration and with tears. (No: 9)

My guests are having a deliriously happy time. I’m glad somebody is. I’m the hostess and I’m not! I serve up. Roast potatoes the Delia way; Crispy chipolatas and bacon; Baby Carrots caramelised with fresh grated ginger; Sprouts and roast chestnuts; Roast parsnips with Cinnamon; Moist Fruit stuffing; Carved Turkey breast and disgusting wishy washy gravy….

The compliments flow, the wine flows, the conversation gets more outrageous, my galley
kitchen is a tip, but I know the cheese course will be trouble free, and we have home-made Christmas Pudding Ice-Cream, Syllabub and fresh fruits and nuts to follow.

I manage the coffee and fudge without serious accidents, and feel my job is done, so sit back with an impressive looking Brandy Bottle in front of me, my special glass, my roll up tin and eventually join in the fun.

My company were blissfully unaware of all the ghastly happenings in my galley, of which I’m glad. I made man promise NEVER to invite friends for Christmas again, bearing in mind, the only time he goes into the galley is to visit the fridge for a beer……………

To summarise: This leaves points one and ten! I mean it, it’s just another roast dinner, well, that’s what we’re told. They’re lying! It’s a monumental task, hard, stressful, fraught, expensive, over lavish, unnecessary, somebody’s always drunk, either the guests, the host, or in my case, both.

This year, twenty of us are all contributing in our local by preparing and bringing all the vegetables, deserts, first courses, nibbles and a French Run for the booze, and our landlady is cooking the geese, ducks, turkey and beef and leaving us to run riot in the comfort of her lovely Inn.

Tsars In Their Eyes

I’m writing this with a large shot of Russian Lemon Vodka and a dish of salted pretzels by my side as I relive my experience of our ten day trip to discover Russia by river. After two days spent on board in St Petersburg our river cruise was to take to Moscow for two days. The distance between the two cities by water is 1400 kilometre (840 mile) made up of rivers, lakes, reservoirs and canals. We were to travel on a German boat carrying 260 passengers, hence the 231 fellow Germans on board and 29 passengers from the UK, including myself and Morty. The summers in Russia are hot and sometimes humid, the winters are famously cold, but we were travelling in the first week of September, the Russian autumn, before the snow falls begin, usually in October.

How would we view the Russia we were to see after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s? How have the Russian people dealt with this freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of trade? How has a country ruled by the Tsars until the 1917 Revolution and then ruled by strong Communist regimes led by such as Lenin and Stalin managed these extreme changes? We were about to gain a little more knowledge and understanding about the Russia of the past and the present on our brief but illuminating journey through a relatively small area of this vast country.

I need a sip of vodka here when I recall the very old Aeroflot aircraft that was to fly us from Gatwick to St Petersburg. I promise you the tyres were bald! However the scheduled economy flight was comfortable arriving after less than four hours at St Petersburg, and once through immigration then transported by coach to St Petersburg’s River Port on the river Neva, where we were soon happily unpacking our gear and ready to explore. Now then, we’re not Group Tour kinda people but, mainly because of my cowardice going to seemingly dangerous destinations, we opted for the organised City tour of St Petersburg, once Petrograd, then Leningrad and now St Petersburg once more.

Peter the Great built the city of St Petersburg 300 years ago as a port for his navy and as a major trade route to Russia’s inland waterways. As with many of the beautiful buildings and colossal engineering achievements we were to see in Russia they were built using forced labour with a huge cost to human lives. This beautiful city was built on marshland so amazingly it consists of 42 separate islands connected by 70 canals and rivers all to be crossed by around 300 bridges. Does an image of Amsterdam and Venice enter your imaginations? We had just two days before we sailed so do I need to tell you how little we were able to see of the 200 palaces, the 50 museums, the 20 theatres, 60 stadiums and 4500 libraries. We benefited from the fact that the city smartened itself up for it’s 300th anniversary in May of this year as royalty and world leaders flocked here to pay homage so all the buildings in the city centre and along the Neva were freshly painted and all the onion domes were freshly gold leafed.

The Hermitage museum was top of our list for our second day but having read that to spend a few moments looking at each item would take nine years we felt slightly fazed. We managed a few hours and with spinning heads saw more art by Picasso, Matisse, Renoir, Gauguin and Monet than I have seen in my life as well as the bejewelled state rooms that were once the Home of Tsar Peter and Catherine the Great.

Later, we broke away from our group to wander about on our own. We strolled down Nevsky Prospekt, the main street where the rich Russians rub shoulders with the poor Russians as this wide street is full of fashionable shops, souvenir pedlars, artists and smart restaurants and the homeless. We sat in a pavement Bistro (Russian for fast-service) by an ornate canal with a view of a church called Church of the Spilled Blood where Alexander 11 was assassinated in 1881, and ate a late lunch of Chic ken Kiev and drank Russian beer.

Tired on this our first day, we took a half hour taxi ride back to the River Port and our boat. The St Petersburg river port is in a very down at heel area, in stark contrast to the dripping wealth in the city centre. Grim high rise blocks of neglected flats, pot holes in the roads and pavements, broken windows, unkempt small parks, beggars, drunks, lots of broken down cars and yet there were lively street kiosks with entrepreneurs selling everything from root vegetables to tobacco and CDs. We know we have to return to St Petersburg for a city break as our appetite is whetted, staying in one of the many luxurious hotels being built and armed with a city dedicated guide book, to do this fairy tale city justice.


The young women of St Petersburg are extraordinarily beautiful, slender and dress in the height of fashion. It was no surprise when reading the English printed edition of the St Petersburg Times to see four full pages of personal adverts from Russian women looking for Western husbands, an equal amount of adverts from Russian Marriage Agencies plus personal adverts from Western men searching for Russian brides. Considering the average wage for a surgeon, a university lecturer or a cleaner is $30 a week then it begins to make economic sense for the Russian women and a different kind of sense for the Western male. Need I say more?

Another surprise was the currency issue. Aware that roubles are unobtainable in the UK the bank advised us to take currency in the form of US Dollars- not traveller’s cheques or sterling. Imagine our surprise when we saw everything from the most expensive boutiques to remote villages on the inland river banks pricing their goods equally in US dollars and Euros with Roubles a very poor third. On the boat itself when we paid a bar bill with US Dollars we were given any change in Euros. Consequently, the $150 we innocently changed to Roubles at an expensive percentage on our arrival became even more expensive when we couldn’t spend them and had to change them back to US Dollars on our departure from Moscow airport at an even more exorbitant percentage. If we’d just taken Euros at least we could have returned to the UK with some convenient money to spend on our next European holiday!

The overland distance to Moscow from St Petersburg is 650 Kilometres. The river route is 1400 kilometres, so were to sail on ten separate waterways to include Europe’s largest lake, its longest river and the world’s longest man-made canal. This waterway journey was to take us five days and we had schedules stops along the way. What did we see of another kind of Russia?

It was a new experience for us as we left St Petersburg and sailed along the river Neva in the early evening only to wake in the early morning to discover were on Lake Lagoda, Europe’s largest lake. We knew it was large because we couldn’t see land to the front, to the rear or either side of us so it seemed like we were on an ocean! This confirmed for me that I never want to do an ocean cruise as I so missed the interest of the river banks, the woodlands, villages, forests and the comfort that land wasn’t very far away. Historically Lake Lagoda is known for its vital role during the 900 day Siege of Leningrad from the German blockade of 1941-1944 when vital supplies were carried across it, even when frozen solid, to the starving population as they held out against invasion. Sadly, we were warned not to drink any tap water in St Petersburg as Lake Lagoda is close to death with pollution from phosphate pollution due to lake side industry and this is where St Petersburg gets it main water supply.

Therefore it was enchanting to eat breakfast on the boat as we sailed into the beautiful River Svir the river that links Lake Lagoda to Lake Onega over a distance of 137 miles. The Svir is landscaped on both bank s by beautiful pine and fir forests with plenty of activity as we saw lumbering, log piles and men working on timber rafts. We were beginning to take to this cruising lark, sitting on the sun deck, sipping Lemon Vodka and espresso coffees. In no time at all we were sailing into Lake Onega, a lake complete with 1300 islands, surrounded by forests and we were to stop and visit one of these islands in the north of the lake (linked to the Arctic by the White Sea canal built by Stalin using forced labour) to Kizhi Island renowned for its miraculous wooden churches and a reconstructed 18th Century village. Our local guide was a little too beatific as she fervently described the meanings of the many religious icons in the churches and her halo was hurting my eyes!

Yet more icons when we stopped south of the White Lake at Goritsy for a tour of a 15th Century monastery. Goritsy is isolated yet, in readiness for future tourism, building luxury hotels and a tourism centre. Perhaps if we returned there in ten years time we may well find it completely unrecognisable as the West catches on to what could be a major resort with fishing, water sports, wildlife and a monastic retreat?


Since the fall of Communism, Russians are now free to worship again. Apparently the number of Russians returning to the Orthodox Church is extremely large. However, there is also a movement to bring back the Tsars and others who are discontented with the progress being made under the move to democracy who wants to see the return to Communism. Isn’t the Church a hard disciplined ruler? Weren’t the Tsars hard selfish rulers with no thought for their subjects? And as for Communism?

Our next waterway was the Volga Baltic canal which begins by linking Lake Onega and the River Kovya and runs for 229 miles. This was so exciting as we were lifted by remarkable locks by as much as 370 feet and dropped again sailing through yet more splendid scenery then entered the
legendary White lake, known as the Tsars Fishing Ground as government boats sailed around taxing the fisherman but not those from the monasteries as Tsars knew better than to tax God!

This gets personal now so another sip of Lemon Vodka. My grandfather was born in Russia and I have the name of his village but no amount of web research could locate it. Rybinsk Reservoir was formed by Stalin damming the Volga in 1941. In order to do this Stalin failed to inform the 700 villages and their occupants of his plans and they were given days to collect their belongings and find alternative accommodation. Wouldn’t you possibly have wondered if this was where your Granddads village may have been? Drowned in true Stalinist style? Even worse for me was that Stalin used educated political Gulag prisoners as construction workers who died at the average of one hundred a day. Suddenly I felt like a spoilt Westerner and could feel the sadness and death all around me as I viewed this feat of engineering.

The complicated network of man-made canals and rivers link the River Volga to all five of Russia’s major seas and flows about eighty miles from Moscow itself so its linked by the Moscow Canal. Again, beautiful to sail along and experiencing another series of lifting by several locks but once more built during the 1930s by Stalinist methods using Gulag prisoners who dug the canal out shovel by shovel. But I mustn’t dwell on this. We had one more stop, until we arrived at Moscow’s Northern River Passenger dock, at the town of Uglich. This industrial town has a small Kremlin, or fortress, preparing us for Moscow, and another church complete with icons where we heard the ethereal singing of a Russian choir. Morty succumbed to a famous Chaika watch made in the factory in Uglich. These are mechanical watches and our guide book advised us to buy one from a market stall as this was more likely to have been made from stolen parts and more reliable than those mad
e in the factory itself. For six pounds it’s still ticking! Animal lovers don’t read this as I bought a divine sable hat and I can’t wait for our winter ice and snow and for people to sing Lara’s Theme to me. My sable hat, when worn with my Russian Baltic amber pendant, makes me feel like A Russian Princess.

The Moscow River Port is about a half an hours drive into the city centre and smarter than St Petersburg dock, so once we’d moored up and knowing we only had two days to see the city we chose the group City Tour. At least this tour took us around the main attractions and trust me, you wouldn’t want to drive yourself. There are six lanes in and out of the city and it is chaos. The other benefit of group tours is avoiding the queues as group tickets makes admission to museums and major sites hassle free. A serious warning about pick pockets as this applies in any major city. Once again, how could this visit give us a chance to contemplate the 2500 historical and architectural monuments, 70 museums, 125 cinemas, 50 theatres, 4500 libraries, universities as well as the obvious such as the Kremlin and Red Square? The Kremlin was a stunning array of palaces, minarets, domes, battlements and towers in every shape and colour. I preferred standing outside the Kremlin rather than enter the Cathedrals and churches as by this time we were both Iconned-out but were more than happy to visit the State Armoury Chamber which was full of the wealth of the Tsars in the form of chalices, Faberge eggs, jewellery and thrones dripping with diamonds-no wonder there was a revolution!

The cobbled Red Square was as impressive as we expected, so impressive that we paid a second visit by night to see it illuminated, though Morty wanted to visit Lenin’s Tomb but sadly it was closed, and we saw the multi-coloured onion domed St Basil’s Cathedral which symbolises Russia -better than the postcards! We did stroll round GUM, Russia’s largest shopping centre. GUM is
like a palace in itself with fountains, waterways, and glass roof, selling the most expensive International designer labels I’ve ever seen under one roof, in contrast to the empty shelves in Soviet times.


I wonder who are buying the luxurious million dollar apartments springing up throughout the city considering the average wage. I have never seen so many casinos in one street as I did driving through Moscow. Who are the people driving the Ferraris and the Lamborghinis? Are they UK football club owners?

Limited time meant we had to make a choice between using the famous Metro at night or the Bolshoi ballet. In fact, we have vowed to return to Moscow as well for a City Break, stay in the centre and take in more. After all, we didn’t even manage a visit to Gorky Park! The Metro, by night to avoid the commuters, was an eye opener. One token buys unlimited distance within the network. The trains travel at over 80mph and there is one arriving every 55 seconds. The doors remain open for exactly one minute for boarding and getting off with an automatic announcement saying they are closing-and then they do. I was scared stiff in case I didn’t get off in time! Of course it is the beauty of the stations that enthral. They are like palaces and museums with chandeliers, mosaics, original art, stained glass, statues and sculptures and they are all different as we discovered as we got on and off at different stations.

Our ten day visit was over and in contrast to the rickety old Aeroflot plane we arrived in our return flight to Heathrow was in a very modern Aeroflot airbus with halfway decent in-flight food and not a bald tyre in sight.

Did we enjoy Russia? Do we recommend you to visit? Yes, whatever way you choose, be it a City Break to St Petersburg or Moscow or a leisurely cruise with a city break at each end you won’t be disappointed -I promise.

All Fur Coat and No Knickers

I'm in a quandry when it comes to judging restaurant food these days. There was nothing wrong with the above first course of pigeon breast on a cauliflower puree. But it had no substance - All Fur Coat and No Knickers. As if some cooks these days think a big plate, a miniscule portion and an arty farty bit of garnish pass for great cooking.


There was nothing wrong with the above deep fried prawns, a fig chutney and dressed leaves. It tasted good but somehow uninspiring. Somehow not honest.


The above side order of Triple Cooked Chips were fantastic. I would have liked three times as many chips and a bowl of mayo as a main course and nothing else.

I know what it is. On almost every plate of food this cook places in front of the diner the various components of the dish Do Not Touch Each Other. Like they've had a row or have a contagious illness. They never meet, never blend, touch either on the plate or in the mouth. This is perfect food cooked without love.

And I would like to meet the chef who introduced the paintbrush to the kitchen. You know - when the chef puts a puree on a big plate and drags the paintbrush through it. I would like to meet the chef who ever first did this and then I would like to smack him.

The Riverside

We've been eating at The Riverside At West Bay since the 1970s when it looked like this.

It looks like this now. The food has changed, under the same ownership, as much as the building has. The first picture is my starter of fresh king scallops. Perfectly cooked and presented.

My main course was Catch of the Day served with a lovely soupy, garlicky sauce. I ate it all and then used my spoon and good bread to wipe my plate clean.

I couldn't decide on the desert so I had a medley as in the above photograph. Service was friendly and relaxed and the view overlooking Lyme Bay added to the eating experience.

At the end of the evening Arthur Watson, the owner, asked if we had enjoyed our evening. I was emboldened with good food and good wine and suggested to him that he would have been far better as a presenter of seafood on the television than Rick Stein and Arthur replied 'Maybe, but I am ten years older than he is'.

But you are better looking, have a far more interesting voice and wittier than he is. Shame the TV Celebrity Chef thing just missed you Arthur. I loved what Floyd said about Chefs. That we all misunderstand the language. If we cook in a kitchen we are a cook. If we run a Restaurant kitchen, then we are a Chef de Cuisine. Although I believe the popular phrase now is Executive Chef.

I was married to a Chef and we once holidayed in Brittany and ate every evening for a week in a small family restaurant with three generations running the kitchen and front of house. The food was historic and on our last evening I approached the Grandmother who kept a watchful eye on everything, and told her in my basic French that my husband was a Chef.

'Chef de que?' she asked.

'Chef de Cuisine' I replied.

Floyd was right wasn't he?

Opposite Sides of the Street

Above is a starter course of King Scallops on a bed of puree of minted peas topped with crisped streaky bacon. Served in an East Street hotel restaurant. It was fine to eat.

Above is a starter course of Queen Scallops on a bed of puree of minted peas. Served in an East Street Restaurant directly opposite. It was fine to eat.

Although I am a fishmonger's daughter and in the 1960s my Mum would cook us King Scallops and crispy bacon topped with a fried egg for Sunday breakfast.

King Scallops are better than Queen as I love to eat the orange coral. Crispy bacon is a far better accompianment than Black Pudding or Chirizo Sausage. And please don't offer me a combination of fish and chilli.

Food does go in trends but I wonder who copied who in my High Street eating places?

The Spy Who Came In For Lunch

It was the normal mid-week lunch service in our small, busy pub in the market square of a West Dorset town. The regular retired men sat at their usual table by the bar arguing whose round it was. Chef busy in the kitchen making crab sandwiches and cooking the fresh catch of the day. I was busy serving drinks and taking food orders. That lovely bubble of conversation, clatter of cutlery and happy customers - creating a warm atmosphere. Pretty perfect.

The bar door opened and a tall, elegant elderly man entered along with an equally well dressed male companion. The man asked where they should sit for lunch and as he seemed to expect table service I showed them to a table, pointed out the blackboard menus and gave them a wine list as requested. I sensed a kind of hush in the atmosphere of the bar. A sharp contrast to the previous relaxed noise level.

As I got back behind the bar my old lunchtime men were huddled together and whispering. The entire bar had stopped talking. Chef and the rest of the kitchen staff appeared through the bar door and peered across to the table where the two elderly men were sitting quietly conversing. But they were well aware of the sensation they'd caused. This was 1979 and the man was Anthony Blunt 'The Fourth Man' of the Cambridge Spy Ring, the other three being Burgess, Maclean and Philby.

I struggled to keep my cool as I took their food order of fresh crayfish salads and a bottle of Chablis. I was used to serving celebrities but not a Real Spy; but they were extremely polite to me, trying to help me through my obvious awe-struck discomfort. They did play up to their audience and gave them what they wanted as they chatted to each other, with frequent touching of hands and much flirting eye contact. Quite outrageous shows of homosexuality in such a place as this. My old men didn't know where to look and grim mutterings of disapproval and '....shouldn't be allowed...' carried through the hushed pub as people couldn't bring themselves to act normally as this news had only just hit the newspapers It was big.

There were more shocks to come as news had spread, as it does, throughout the small town and as soon as we'd closed for the afternoon we had a visit from the local police telling us that MI5 would be paying us a visit later that day for questions.

And they did. MI5 wanted to know every little detail about Blunt and his companion. What they were wearing, what they ate, time of arrival and departure. Did they talk to anybody else while they were here? No. Only me. No, they didn't use the toilets. It was so exciting.

I was right excited when I 'phoned our weekly local paper telling the all about it as I fancied a bit of free publicity. It wasn't to be - the main news that week was a seagull stuck up a chimney and having to be rescued. Perhaps Blunt was too top secret.

Fresh Market Food Phnom Penh

No matter how poor a country the true sense of the people is in the fresh foods found in their local markets. The above is a very small selection of the colourful home grown foods in the market at Phnom Penh on the Mekong Delta in Camodia. I know I ate all of these foods on the boat but can't tell you what they are - aren't they appetising?

Posh Fish 'n' Chips

Perfect Posh Fish and Chips. That little bit of a green splodge is a puree of mushy peas. Those Sumo chips were delicious. The batter on the fish was very light and crispy and the fish inside creamy textured and perfectly cooked. Home made tartare sauce meant I didn't have to ask for mayo on the side for chip dunking. The half a lemon had been flash heated on the grill so it didn't make the fish cold. Nice touch.

Well done The Bull Hotel.

Razor Clams

I ate these last night. They are razor clams. I will never eat them again. They are obscene.