Rain and tofu in Malvern

Lolas with Elgar, Malvern, May 2021

'New Normal' has begun - Lola II and I have been on holiday. We made it all the way to Malvern, only 14 months after the trip was supposed to happen.

Not without incident, though. Lola II's car has been playing up for a while, refusing to start unless a magical incantation is performed (and the accelerator is pumped). My car, usually so reliable, had a bit of a fit just as I drove into the town and started beeping an error on the dashboard, coughing and refusing to go faster than 30 mph. I called my garage friends back in Leamington and told them what the dashboard said, and they reassured me that the car was still safe to drive, and the fault would need diagnosing using the computer-aided diagnostic system that all garages use. So we ignored all of that and had lunch with Mr M before sending him south to visit his mum and then stay at Lola Towers until we returned.

From the comfortable Airbnb accommodation I called a local garage who seemed very friendly and agreed that if I called in first thing next day they could at least find out more about the problem, and if it was a quick fix they could probably sort it out on the same day. So that's what I did - leaving Lola II asleep I arrived at the garage where they diagnosed a problem with the spark plugs and/or leads and/or coil pack. I formulated all sorts of backup plans involving Mr M coming to fetch us and me leaving the car and coming back for it by train, but changing the plugs seemed to fix it and I drove off, only for the fault to recur before I'd reached the end of the road. After changing the other two parts as well and driving round the block to double check, I got the all clear. 

Lola was up and ready for action when I got back so we went out for breakfast and then into town, where we visited the very helpful Tourist Information Centre, wandered around various quaint shops, and followed part of a walking trail around the town. Unfortunately the day was wet - it didn't rain all the time, but there were regular showers and it was cold. Despite this we learned about the Malvern Spring Water and Water Cure businesses, the Lea and Perrins Worcestershire Sauce business, and the various eminent personages associated with Malvern including Edward Elgar, C. S. Lewis, George Bernard Shaw and Charles Darwin. And there was hot chocolate and cake, of course.

On Saturday we finally managed to attend the tofu cookery course that we'd booked in January 2020 and had to put off at least twice. Before Covid there would have been six people on the course but it had to be reduced to just four, and we weren't allowed to share any food except what the teacher (Lizzy) cooked. We cooked and tasted different types of tofu cooked and flavoured in many ways - sweet and sour, Mexican, Italian, Indian, Middle Eastern, soy and ginger, braised, fried, scrambled, and fish-flavoured using seaweed then battered and fried. We tasted that last one with chips and peas at the end of the day, and it was better than the real fish and chips I'd had in a fancy pub the night before. All the dishes we cooked had to be taken away with us, and there were lots! You can see all the plastic tubs in the background of the picture below.

The weather was still not good on Sunday, so we decided not to head for a walk on the hills but went to an English Heritage site instead - Witley Court and Gardens, which was one of the most interesting I've come across. It started out as a Jacobean mansion, and was enlarged several times by subsequent owners to reach the peak of opulence between 1850 and 1885. It remained as a lavish stately home until it caught fire in 1937, after which the owner deemed it too expensive to repair, sold off all the furniture and artefacts that weren't damaged by the fire, and then sold off the house and land as well. It has remained a ruin except for the gardens and the restored fountain but there is quite a bit of photographic and presumably documented information about what it looked like and who lived and worked there in its heyday.

It has a very similar atmosphere to all the Roman and Greek remains I've visited, or the monasteries destroyed during the Reformation, because you're essentially asked to imagine what the various rooms might have looked like based on not much more than brick walls. In this case, however, it's much more recent history: we know for sure which rooms were used for what, and there are photographs. We joined a guide who talked about the life and wages of the servants below stairs and took us through the service areas. It was all really interesting, and we would have also had a lovely walk around the grounds except that I got really cold sitting outside for lunch (inside was forbidden) and then it started to rain.

Our first 'proper' holiday since the pandemic started, and a great success. Here's to infection rates dropping, lockdown lifting and more of the same.