Although we’re enjoying the beautiful summer weather we’re having at the moment, it comes with it’s downside too. Of course.

The nice warm daytime temperatures tend to clash with the cooler afternoon and evening air here in the hills, which, on a regular base, cause severe thunderstorms. Most of the time it ‘just’ involves a lot of lightening and thunder and sometimes torrential rains,

Got rain?

.... but every now and than these storms produce hail. Big hail. Golf ball size hail, I’m not kidding.

Which causes holes. Big holes. In the AC and vent covers.

Especially since they’re 15 years old and brittle. Like this:

Oh well …. What can you do?

Order new covers and shrouds (k-ching!) and replace them:

Looks like fun!

   

We added some different vent covers so we can have the vents open even if it rains:

Great job honey!

And also replaced our front AC cover, since it was old and sort of falling apart, if you see what I mean:

 

So much better! We started to look a little rough around the edges there …

OK. Time for some R&R. We heard through the grapevine, there was a little summer event going on in the tiny town of Rochford only about 30 minutes away from us, so off we went.
Notice the words ‘little’ and ‘tiny’ in the previous sentence?

Well, I think this was about the smallest town event we’ve ever seen. 

 

They have a funky saloon though!

The town itself turns out to have only 15 permanent residents and than there’s another handful that live in the surrounding area. Throw in a few lost tourists and there you have it … Rochford Day!

We walked up and down main street, which by the way is the only street, ...

 ... sampled some chili at the chili cook-off (which was the guaranteed winner since there was only one contestant) and bought and tasted a view homemade deserts.

 

  

All in all, not really worth the drive if it wasn’t for the beautiful drive through the hills itself, and the goodies we brought home.

And it was sort of a hoot, just for the ‘small-town’ experience of it all!

Let’s see, what else did we do? Golf of course. We either go very early in the morning or in the early evening when we have the course practically to ourselves.

Talking about golf, James renewed the old grips on his clubs with new, and somewhat over sized, ones. How hard can it be? Well, once you get the hang of it, and with the (indispensable) help from a vice, not too hard, it turned out …..

Tada!

When we don’t have a thunderstorm, we eat dinner outside and we make good use of the BBQ.

 

Merlin is first at the table, especially if it’s chicken:

 

We have a saying in Holland that says, ‘one swallow doesn’t make it summer yet’. 
Well, how about six?

 

  Yup, definitely summer!

By the way, they’re Barn Swallows. They’re making a mess, but they’re so adorable ….

 

This one especially …. just look at that face!