If it's Saturday it must be Italy

This weekend was the shortest possible trip to Italy to see the work-in-progress at the Hovel in the Hills ™. We flew 7:15 am Saturday morning and back 11:30 am Sunday morning. Since we didn't fancy getting up at 4:00 am to drive up an icy M11 we decided to take the Stansted Express and treat ourselves to an on-airport hotel stay Friday night, the Radisson SAS is only five minutes stroll from the terminal.

I was most impressed. The hotel is smart and the Tapas Restaurant was excellent. Given a captive audience and a good percentage of business travellers it is easy for a hotel restaurant to get complacent, not so here. The food was well cooked, the prices reasonable and the Spanish waitress friendly and attentive. Much better that our local Tapas round the corner in Old York Road.

In Italy, Daniele and the workmen have made a start: creating a second driveway for the upper half of the property and digging a trench round the pizza oven and the lamia. This will help with drainage of the water that flows down the hill and so keep the house dry.


View of new drive and drainage ditch round pizza oven and side of lamia(taken from the roof of the lamia).