Highlights Of St Albans

1. My cousin, S and husband, D, moved out of London about a year ago, to St Albans, a 2-hour train ride from Brighton and just 25 minutes by train from Kings Cross in London, in search of a better quality of life and in preparation for a better environment to raise a child. Now a year later, they are happily settled in a great house (altho S is still agitating over which curtain should go with which room in light of the paint and the print of her sheets) with a lovely garden and waiting for baby to arrive in early January 2008.



2. The English countryside was at its best the weekend I was at St Albans. With sunshine, blue skies and a light breeze, the weather was most cooperative for our drive out to the countryside, a meander along the paths, the highlight of the walk was the wild blackberries growing on the bushes! I've never ever picked and eaten fruits off plants like that (the possibility of an e-coli infection did briefly cross my mind but because this was the wild, I figured there would be nobody spraying any pesticide so it would be relatively safe. Besides, I kinda rubbed each berry with my fingers before I scoffed them down). The novelty was an experience in itself. Yummy blackberries, plump and ripe for the picking.



3. Food. An important aspect of my life as my friends who read this blog would already know. I had a couple of nice pub lunches, value for money in great ambience, including a 300-year old pub in the country.
S, always the fabulous cook (she was set to work in the kitchen by her mum at a young age, and boy, did she learn well), served a great steamboat the first night I arrived. She followed that up with a dinner of homemade pizza and allowed me to "play" by making the pizza base. The dinner on the third night was this lovely duck l'orange as she was inspired by hearing me talk about the dish in the car the day before. Lucky, lucky me. I love S and the fabulous way she takes care of me whenever I visit!



4. Other sights include the St Albans Cathedral, a large and awesome-looking piece of architecture, the sprawling park with the huge pond ("This is a snack-free zone" signs dot the pond at various points telling people not to feed any bread or grain to the ducks. However many people have selective illiteracy when it comes to starting a feeding frenzy amongst the birds, us included) next to the Cathedral where families with children in prams and dogs on leashes, reiterate why so many families relocate from bustling London to places like St Albans where life moves at a slower and more relaxing pace.

Another lovely weekend in England spent with family whom I haven't seen in two years. Priceless.