Killoughs visit for Easter

I'm trying to play catch-up on the blog posts....so much happening lately!! Kent's parents were here for a visit over Easter weekend - from April 9-15. We were planning to take a trip to another part of England, since they have already seen much of Oxford last Nov, but alas we ended up spending the time here in Oxford, just relaxing. Kent and I had just gotten back from India, and the Killoughs were on to Vienna and Paris after England. It was nice to just be in one place, and just do some fun things at home and not in a hotel! Here are only a few of the many great pics we took....
We went on a couple of nice walks around town, of course stopping for a pint at several pubs along the way. This pic is in Christ Church meadows, where all of the bird-folk are going through their spring mating rituals! These swans actually did a choreographed dance which included fluffing their wings, chasing away another swan (his mistress), and craning their necks in all sorts of flexible positions. Here they made a perfect heart! Another set of swans has built a nest near the path, and I am still checking up on it every day. I saw her get up only once, and there are 7 huge eggs there! The father (I presume) stays very close and chases off anything that comes close.
We've also been watching suck families, geese and another funny water bird that we couldn't even identify in the bird book we picked up with the Killoughs.
Oxford Botanic GardenWe saw all of this on the way to the, a large, well maintained garden that contains almost every variety of plant that grows in England. We saw many of the plants that are starting to pop up in our garden.

We discovered a new pub - The Isis Tavern. Well, actually I run by there all the time and have never gone in! One day we all took a walk up the river to the Iffley Lock (built in 1632 I now know!) and stopped in to the Isis.

Another day, we also did our favorite walk up the river - about a 4 mile trek from pub to pub. The walk takes almost all day, but is so nice to walk along the river, stop for a pint, and check out the wildlife. First, we were forced to duck in to the Waterman's Arms not too far from our house, since it was raining!

Then we headed on up the river to The Perch for a pint or a PIMMs cocktail. It's actually a really nice French restaurant (&pub). The sun was shining now, and the warm weather felt great! We sat outs ide at The Perch, which has a really cool outdoor area with tents, BBQ going, and a playground.

We continued our walk thround the Oxfordshire "meadows" with horses and cows mingling with the geese and ducks. Our desination was The Trout, another upscale "pub." We had an early reservation for dinner, and enjoyed some great food! This is definitely a walk we'll do with all of our Oxford visitors (as we did with the Millers!).
Over the course of the Killoughs' visit, we also had several other good "British" meals, including my version of high tea lunch at home and good ol' fish and chips out at the pub. Kent also bought a small BBQ and cooked steaks for us one night - using charcoal!

Easter Sunday, we all dressed up and went to a nice church service.


Afterwards, we treated ourselves to a classic British high tea at the Old Parsonage Hotel. We had several types of tea, little sandwiches with the crusts cut off, and of course scones with clotted cream and home made jam. Yum! The 3 types of cake were a little overload, so we decided to take a walk through the University Parks.

Towards the end of their visit, we "hired" a car for the day and took a drive through the countryside.

They dropped me off at an interview, and then we had a nice lunch. Kent experienced driving a manual transmission on the wrong side of the road. :-)

We really enjoyed having Kent's parents here for a visit! Looking forward to the rest of our visitors!!
--Karen