Our little bit of summer

It’s mid July and so far the weather has chucked rain, grey skies and chilly winds at us. We’re having a truly authentic English summer.
We were momentarily fooled into thinking that it was actually going to be a dry, sunny South African type summer by having a few days of sun, muggy heat and summer in June.
On one such weekend was a weekend (in early June) I visited my cousin, Dylan, his wife Kerry and their little one, Louie.
I arrived at about lunchtime and was immediately put to work assisting Dylan put up a sort of sun tent in the garden (which looked rather like it should have people sitting on colourful cushions being fed grapes and waved with banana leaves).
We achieved this in about 10 minutes of figuring out where poles fitted together and where fabric zipped up, while a neighbour hung over the garden wall and told us that they’d taken hours to put up theirs and we would be no different.
I then ambled inside to where Kerry was making a salad for our picnic.
We took everything into the garden in our Turkish sun tent, and ate a feast of salad, olives, crusty bread, cheeses and rosé wine.
At 2pm sharp Dylan rushed off down to the local pub to watch the South Africa vs. England rugby match, while Kerry, Louie and I followed at a more leisurely pace and sat outside the pub in the early summer heat drinking beer shandies.
The next day I went for a cycle in Richmond Park on mountain bikes with a friend, Warren.
He’s a bit of a sports fanatic, and I spent most of my time trying to catch him up, and look like I wasn’t panting and sweating up a storm!
Near a little dam in Richmond Park we put out a picnic blanket, ate lunch and watched the swans parade their little babies around, while the sun beat gently down on us.
It felt like the beginning of a warm summer yet to come….


Picture 1: Dylan and Louie
Picture 2: Kerry and Louie
Picture 3: Me and Louie
Picture 4: The baby swans at Richmond park