Swindon in the Past Lane

These daring highline walkers are helping fund raise to send Jake Hirsch Holland to Ocotal, Nicaragua to work with Performers Without Borders. They are performing at the Spectrum Renault building until 5pm today, so if you rush over to West Swindon you might just catch them. Young would be highliners What it's all about

And then in the afternoon we went to Rouen - there was no hanging about on this trip! Famous for its medieval streets and the Notre Dame Cathedral, we were deposited for a mere two hours to explore this ancient city. With so little time we were restricted as to how much we could actually visit. The Notre Dame Cathedral was, of course a must, but even here we only had time to walk briskly round. Building began on the present cathedral in the 12th century but a church has stood on the site since the 4th century. In 1876 the construction of the Tour Lanterne (Lantern Tower) elevated the cathedral to the tallest building in the world, a record it retained for just four years. Monet painted the cathedral more than 30 times between 1892-93, capturing it in different light and weather conditions. In April and June 1944 WWII bombing raids badly damaged the south aisle while the North Tower was burned. Since then the Cathedral has been in a permanent state of repair. On the day of our vi...

I don't very often leave the confines of Swindon, but I recently marked a significant birthday and my daughter treated me to a weekend in France to lessen the pain. We had a wonderful, if frenetic, two days courtesy of Newmarket Holidays and saw some amazing sights. We stayed at the Best Western, St Quentin, Maurepas, an adequate hotel where they were oddly very precious about how many croissants one ate at breakfast, and woe betide guests if you messed up the ticket system, as I managed to! Our first trip was to Monet's magnificent gardens at Giverny. Now, I hate to be a typical moaning Brit abroad, but really, the National Trust would do it so much better! Monet moved to the idyllic village of Giverny in 1883 where he began work on the garden that inspired him for more than 43 years. Ten years after moving in, Monet bought a neighbouring piece of land where he created his water gardens, inspired by the Japanese gardens he loved so much. Sadly today the gardens are separ...