A Room with a View

We arrived in Jersey this morning to fine weather. First impressions are favourable; the road from the airport to St Aubin Bay was very narrow, lined with quaint houses, and our hotel is right on the sea front and is absolutely beautiful. It is a white painted old manor house with lovely gardens and a swimming pool. Grandma's room is right at the front of the hotel on the first floor, spacious and with lovely views over the gardens and the sea. I think it is the best room in the hotel because it is the only one with a triple window and Grandma is delighted with it. Our self-catering cottage is round the side of the hotel so no views, but it is very well decorated and clean with a smart kitchen; it was originally a cider press. We all went for the short walk into the village of St Brelade which has loads of cafes and restaurants and had a light lunch in the Bon Viveur, the menu was a strange mix of French and English, for example Alasdair's meal was Moules and Chips. The village is very pretty with a harbour and winding streets. James, Ally and Davie walked out across the sands to explore St Aubin Fort and Grandma and I walked back to the hotel. She was doing her best with the walking but she is a lot slower than she used to be which is fair enough, after all she is eighty two. She didn't complain at all and she didn't accept my subtle (I hope) suggestion of stopping for a coffee, but every now and then she would stop to look at the view, or read a notice or look at some flowers, which gave her a chance to rest for a minute. By the time we got back to the hotel the boys were right behind us; Grandma went up to her luxurious room and we all went for a wee rest. James, Ally and Davie all fell fast asleep but I decided to try out the hotel pool and I had a lovely swim for about forty minutes. When I got back to the cottage the boys were all still fast asleep so I nipped back into the village to get some groceries. A pleasant evening ensued, and after dinner Grandma invited us back to her room for a coffee, I'm so glad she likes it! Ally was showing me some of the Ovid poems that he is studying for his A Level Latin, we had a good laugh about Ovid's attitude to women and the embarrassing frankness of some of his poems! I wonder if Ally should be applying to study Classics instead of Law, because he loves it so much.