Channel Islands: Guernsey

Gemma and I decided to make the most of the Easter break by taking a few days off after Easter, thus turning a five day break into a 10 day holiday. We used this massive time away to the utmost by visiting some of the Channel Islands - a bunch of islands in he English channel between UK and France. Now event though these islands have a different currency, don't pay British tax (or something like that), and are much closer to France then England, they are still part of the UK and a very popular tourist destination.

Some countries scare off toursits with complex visa applications, the Channel islands use the less conventional , yet just as effective, method of pill boxes. You can just see Baiky keeping an eye out for intruders.

Their popularity stems from two main reasons - they are waaaay down south, and so have the best weather of any UK territory and they are the only English territories (I think territory is the wrong word here) to be occupied by the Nazis (at least I am unaware of any others; feel free to educate me in the comments section and I will dutifully ignore said comment).

 We found this sign on one of our walks; about 60 years to late I reckon.

 We started off by spending a couple of days in Guernsey. We were greeted by a lazy rain. I call it lazy because it could not be bothered to go around us, and instead soaked us right through to our bones.

 Best. Weather. Ever. Also, funny story, it turns out the Gemma's jacket is NOT waterproof. Ahahahahahaha. I think I found that tidbit of information funnier than she did.

This was an issue because we arrived at 6am (via ferry, AND we bought Gemma's car!!!) and we did not have access to our hotel room for about 4 hours. So after going for a walk and visiting the lighthouse at St Martin's Point and Petit Bot Bay we were thoroughly drenched.

St Martin's Point.

Luckily the weather in our trip only improved from there, enabling us to visit all the sites Guernsey had to offer intrepid adventurers with only a couple of days to spare. We wandered around the tiniest church imaginable. 

Don't be fooled by this picture, I am showing you the angle that makes it look big (and, yes you can go inside)!

This, not surprisingly given my description, did not really take all that long.

This angle makes it look slimmer (I promised the church wouldn't show the 'fat' photo)

We visited the German Occupation Museum, which detailed the occupation by the Germans. Most interesting here (besides the tanks of course) was the tale of the poor administrator in charge at the time, whose name escapes me and google failed me. He had to represent the citizens of Guernsey while still maintaining the outrageous German rules imposed on his citizens.

Gemma and I also met up with Gemma's friend Paul, a local denizen. He showed us the trick of getting across to Lihou Island.

Here I am trying to get to Lihou island.

It turns out the the tides in Guernsey (and the rest of the channel islands) display one of the largest tidal ranges in the world, allowing the brave to safely wander across to the nearby island if you time it right. Just, you know, make sure you get back again in time too.

Paul parts the waters for us!

 More importantly, past or the cars lined up for an annual drag race. I have never seen so many elite cars at one time. 

This was followed up a few days later by a 'Hill Climb'. Pictured here are some F3s, but there were also a whole bunch of sports cars worth more than I'll ever see in a lifetime.

Fortunately, we also found time to take a leisurely drive around the coast of the island, stop off at Castle Cornet (for some history) and I even managed to sneak in a little run. I also probably could not finish this post without describing the difficulty in finding a beer on Good Friday before 7pm (and the strange looks we got when we asked for one).

Found one!

Operation Snooker Awesome

Here it finally is! The post you've all been waiting for (or is it being? this is harder to figure out than 'then' or 'than'). I am you all remember the allusion I made renovating my snooker table at Christmas.

The table I bought for about £100 is a slate bed, 7 foot snooker table. The problem was the rubbers were old, the pockets were cut poorly, the cloth was old, and the woodwork looked a little tatty. So Gemma and I rolled up our sleeves and got dirty.

My table before I inexplicably decided to take it apart.

First we painted the entire thing white. It took a few coats but we got there in the end. At first, to protect the cloth (I wasn't sure if I was going to change the cloth at this time) we covered the cloth on the rails with blue tape. 

Christmas time!

It looked so good we decided the blue stripe was a keeper!

Gemma paints a Teal stripe on my rail. Note the big-arse, oak snooker legs on the left of the photo. They came from a full-size table and will make more sense later...

Next we had to fix the rails. I took one apart and Gemma and I spent a few hours debating if we should remake these ourselves. With the correct tools it wouldn't have been too hard, but unfortunately we lacked a band saw and without a mould the shape the rubbers I decided it would be better just to get these done by professionals.

 

Prepping the slate for the cloth.

Following this we stripped back the cloth, wiped down the slate, and recovered with tournament grade cloth in a lovely deep purple. I have never recovered a table before, but  had seen it done a couple of times. It wasn't too difficult, but would have been easier with a better staple gun. 

Cutting the cloth to size (for the table and for the rails).

While I understand nap, at first I wasn't aware that the cloth can be put on upside down as well as back-to-front and nearly put it on wrong. Luckily I figured that out before it was too late, I also think I could have stretched the cloth a bit tighter as it seems slower than I would like it was tough to pull it neatly over the final side pocket.

 
Stapling the cloth to the table.

After that we had to cover the rubbers. This was the most fun. Luckily the store that redid my rails numbered each one and provided arrows to ensure I put the cloth on the right way, and then I spent ages watching a youtube video by billiards.com.au to learn how it was done (repeat x6).

 Banging in the retaining slips on the cushions.

The final touches were drawing on the table markings and leveling the table. More time spent on the net learning the ratios of table length to dots, lines, and Ds followed by using coasters and a spirit level to set the table.

I used the string to make sure my line markings were perfectly centered. Gemma judged me. She judged me poorly.

I couldn't get it quite as level as I would have liked, it seemed to be bowing in the middle. So I jumped on Gumtree and found a bloke selling snooker table legs for 10 quid a pop and viola, my new and improved table!

Aaaaaaaaand done!