Author Archives: maryjane678

Snapshots of a country part two

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on October 21st 2022. As promised this is the second part of our snapshot tour of Britain, and this time we are in England, visiting some quite unique gardens and galleries. We spent a day recently visiting The Newt in Somerset, situated betweenContinue reading “Snapshots of a country part two”

Snapshots of a country

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on October 14th 2022. We have spent the last two weeks travelling around England and Wales, visiting friends and family after we finished our house-sit in North Wales, and what has struck me, as someone who no longer lives in the country andContinue reading “Snapshots of a country”

A singing parrot, a glut of mushrooms and an armchair African adventure

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on September 29th 2022. ‘I think she’s getting to like you,’ I said, as Michael carefully eased Monty the parrot out of her day cage. ‘What makes you think that?’ said Michael dubiously, balancing her carefully on his arm as he walked throughContinue reading “A singing parrot, a glut of mushrooms and an armchair African adventure”

Snowdonia

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on September 22nd 2022. This week we find ourselves up in north Wales, looking after a menagerie of dogs, cats, fishes, chickens and a female parrot rather confusingly called Monty. Before we began our nomadic life on Olivia Rose, Wales was the placeContinue reading “Snowdonia”

Home is where the heart is.

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on September 9th 2022. It’s just over five years since we sold our cottage, bought Olivia Rose and left our much-loved Welsh hills to cruise through Europe. Although we might have left the UK in body, we hadn’t truly left it in ourContinue reading “Home is where the heart is.”

A trip to the Netherlands

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on August 30th 2022. We’ve left the boat for a week and headed north, traveling to pastures new. How do I begin to describe the Netherlands? It’s a wonderful thing when a country takes you so completely by surprise. We’ve travelled much ofContinue reading “A trip to the Netherlands”

The Canal de la Somme

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on August 14th 2022. This week we joined the Canal de la Somme and a very beautiful stretch of water it is too. Beautiful but weedy. The word ‘weedy’ doesn’t adequately describe it. Weeds are often spindly, insubstantial and if we apply theContinue reading “The Canal de la Somme”