Beware the sick boat.

Friday 5th June to Sunday 7th June 2015

Throughout our time together, Diane has always been very considerate and over the past week she has been struggling with both her asthma and a cold; struggling so much that for her, the only course of action for her was to spread the "love" around and to that end she has succeeded.

Friday afternoon arrived as did that unmistakable feeling in the back of the throat and you just know what is coming and that it would get worse before it gets better.

We decided to not move for the weekend as we were both feeling pretty crap.

However we also knew that there was no use sitting on our backsides and feel too sorry for ourselves and set our minds to do our usual bit of exploring the area.

A stroll up to High Road - both up and down - gave us a bit of an idea about the lie of the land; there is a unique make-up to this part of London, but not anything that would cause us any problems.
It very much appears to be a mixture of many many different ethnic backgrounds and socio-economic profiles.
We were reminded that it was around the Tottenham area that many of the riots from a few years ago were at there highest - given the differences that we could see, there would appear to be some simmering tensions given the right circumstances.
 

"Tottenham Cross" 

First time I have heard of this - "namer of clouds" - but Luke Howard is
regarded as the Father of Meteorology

Diane had looked up the National Trust app on her phone and discovered that just down in Hackney was a property that would be worth looking at, so on Sunday we put our coughs behind us and headed off by train via Stratford and found the place in question - downtown Hackney Central.
 

The outside of Sutton House

Sutton House is just on 500 years old and was built by Sir Ralph Sadlier who worked for Thomas Cromwell - the Chief Minister to Henry VIII.
 

The painting is of Sir Ralph Sadlier - the original owner

Wood panelling in every room

Some random person getting in shot

Over the years it has gone through many transformations including being divided into two properties.
 

The kitchen similar to how it existed ,but with a lot of changes

The Chapel ....

...and the courtyard

one of the rooms changed later in the life of house

and another

hello little girl

When originally built the area was just a small village, and well separated from London - very much like a rural area. These days it is simply a part of London - not central London certainly, but not on the edge either.

So long as we remain in the UK we will continue to visit these properties to allow us to learn even more about the country and many parts of history that are not generally known, but which help us to understand more.


It is now Sunday night and Diane managed to watch the Men's Final at the French Open and we are trying to just relax - the end result of whatever we both have is that we are completely knackered each night - even without doing anything else - but it is not our nature to simply do nohing when feeling a bit sick - we need to be out there getting on with things - thankfully however, tomorrow is a public holiday in Australia and we will have a long weekend to help.