Getting Heaven into us / Home Group Meeting in Bedford

On Saturday we went to Bedford for lunch and a short walk but mainly to meet up with our old home group leaders.  Once again we all piled into our Previa and headed off around the M25.  The journey was uneventful - the A1(M) is a pretty good road.  Bedford along the embankment is a lovely setting.

The Embankment pub is a good location for lunch, but don't expect to be served in a hurry.  We arrived early and were told that the staff were in a meeting and we'd have to wait for them!  This is an appalling error from a junior member of staff. The service was generally slow but the food was quite nice, and when a sweet was delivered cold it was quickly replaced.  During lunch my 2 hours of parking expired and I had to go out to move the car.  After lunch we walked along the embankment for a while.  Someone kindly volunteered to take a picture of us all.  You can see us if you visit the album above.

When we returned home I got straight to work on the next day's sermon.  You can see the results here.

So I had an enjoyable, if busy weekend.

Home Group Social

On Thursday members of our home group went for a walk through the Stock countryside (Click the Hybrid button for a better impression). It made a nice change from the usual end of term meal. We each got to have some conversation with all the other members who attended - eight of us in all - which would have been difficult at a meal. It was very enjoyable, and I slept well after it. Everyone said we should do it again, and I hope we do.
I've posted a few pictures, I didn't take many, that was not the point of the walk. We started at the church, walked round the back of Stock, the across the main road and down past the Crondon Park Golf club, following the edge of the wood, then up Swan Lane, and into "The Cock" for a rest and a drink.
We were speculating how far we had walked, from the map I'd say 4-5Km (or about 3 miles)