Warming Up

8300/21219

We're staying in a very nice hotel in Crete. It's not quite White Lotus, but it's as near as we're ever going to get. Our room has its own tiny swimming pool and overlooks the blue waters of the cove we're on.

In spite of the all-inclusive (which inevitably involves a few asterisks of things that are not included, but which is still pretty impressive) I have not cracked and drunk "free" champagne. Though I am trying to insist that Catie drinks enough to cover costs and she's frankly doing pretty badly (she had some last night but only had one glass today).

I thought I'd be able to have more than my fair share of iced coffee, mocktails and ice cream to justify the spend on the vacation, but after a hearty lunch and one fake pina colada I was so full that I couldn't really face anything at all in the afternoon.

Other patrons seems to be cooler about the free stuff on offer. It's probably a sign that I don't belong here that my main concern is to try and get value for money, even if that makes my heart explode. Everyone else seems to be pretty chill and just trying to have a nice holiday rather than finding out how many Cornettos one human can eat in an hour.

Most importantly there's an excellent kids' club which means that for a few of our ten days Catie and me can actually have a bit of a grown-up holiday (which just means sitting on the beach, reading, but I am all for that), though today we picked up the kids at lunchtime and had a long lunch with them and when they'd gone back afterwards I missed having them around.

RHLSTP with Andrew O Neill is now up here.

This is a really good one. If you don't know Andrew's stuff, you should! Check them out!