Surrey

Surrey, in England, is generally considered to be a 'posh' county. It's where I lived before I moved to Pompey, and I can tell you that every posh county has its underside, in many ways the more so because the upperside is so well-heeled.
Whenever I'd go to some course or meeting out of county, someone would invariably ask where I worked and I'd say Surrey and they'd say,
'Ooh, Surrey,' in a mock nose-turney-uppey kind of way and then I'd get a bit defensive, because it was a matter of pride in the teaching profession if you could survive in a rough school, and tell them that actually, where I worked had been demarcated as an Education Action Zone and then they'd shut up and so would I.

Surrey in BC is a huge, sprawling city that many people who don't live in it think is entirely inhabited by Indians and Pakistanis. This is far from the truth. If it makes you exclaim,
'Ooh, just like Birmingham then,' I can see why you'd think that, but no. It is possible to buy a much larger house for less money there than in Richmond or Vancouver, but believe you me, there are some very, very nice houses there.

To the south of the city of Surrey, some might say that it actually IS the south part of Surrey, is the small town of White Rock. On the map it is literally a square of streets and it draws to itself a bit of a postcode war. I am told that people want to say they live in White Rock rather than Surrey, so they tend to be a bit imaginative with the boundaries.
Further along the coastline, coming back from the US border and towards Richmond, are other small communities, Ocean Park and Crescent Beach. From this coastline around the shelf known as Boundary Bay you can see Mount Baker in Washington. You can also see Bald Eagles, Cooper's Hawks, Great Blue Herons, Snow Geese, owls and many more birds.

Yesterday, my friend Yvonne and I went on a little reccie of the area. I was struck as we drove down to the beach at White Rock, by how much it reminded me of the small town of Cobh in County Cork and it was as though Yvonne were thinking this at the same time.
We had a nose around, we had coffee in a cafe that promised 'coffee with attitude' although we didn't discover the 'tude at all, rather the opposite in fact and then we finished up having an early supper in a small Italian restaurant in South Surrey proper.

This morning, back in Richmond, the temperature had risen and the sun was shining. Perfick. The rat guy came and couldn't find one, although he kindly told us he had a body for us that we could send to the taxidermist, how often does that happen? Rarely, fortunately.

We are awaiting the return of the hummingbirds, they should arrive within the next two weeks and Kris has put out the first of the feeders just in case. As soon as they do arrive, the twitchers with their huge-lensed cameras will be all over them like paparazzi around tiny celebrities.