Friends and festivities and the art of the road trip

English people do not understand distance. Not long after I moved to Witney, I was on the bus from Oxford one day and a bloke and a woman were talking. He'd been down to London for the first time in about 10 years.

"Ooh," said the woman. "You'll not find me going to that London. It's too big. And too far away."

Actually, it's 60 miles. It's less than an hour on the train. But when I popped down for an evening for my friend Emma's leaving drinks, her workmates were amazed. 'No, really, what brought you to London today, so you could be here this evening? And where are you staying tonight - you're not going back, surely?"

Hahaha. Fortunately, our yankee friend Kim, coming from Kansas, shares our view on travel. An 80 minute trip to Bristol is definitely do-able for an evening, specially if you can stay over.

So it was that, after stuffing ourselves with food and wine and brilliant conversation at a birthday lunch for our gorgeous friend Sophie, it was a very easy thing to hop in the car, collect Kim and head down to Bristol for a combined birthday-cum-housewarming for Lizzy and Steph.

Bristol, I have to say, is starting to grow on me. It still feels a lot more industrial than, say, Leeds (which is now all inner-city genteel), but I'm starting to like it. And Lizzy and Stephfallie are just the gorgeousest hosts, with lashings of food and booze served student bbq style, with drinking games and singing til the wee small hours. Ants had quite a head on the next day, something to do with 11 cans of strongbow. And opinion remains divided on whether Kim threw up - she reckons not, but can't be certain.

But once we've been and done the Italian Job, the plan is definitely to try to come back to England, and there would definitely be worse places to live, than Bristol...