We were booked into Dinkley Court in Burcot south of Oxford. This is a big house set in huge gardens leading down to the river Thames. We soon availed ourselves of the huge log pile and had a roaring fire going in the lounge. A communal supper was enjoyed on arrival, although Joy & Dik were rather late. Ironically, they had travelled down to the area earlier in the week and had the shortest journey to Burcot. However, travelling 40 miles in the rush hour took 3 hours and reminded them of why they moved to Egmanton!

On the Saturday we all travelled to Oxford to see the sights and have some retail therapy. Dik showed the group round Hertford College, his old stomping ground. We then made our way to the covered market, which is superb. There are many traditional traders including a seriously good cheese stall and several butchers with a good range of meats. Several of them had whole deer hanging in the window - I just hope there are no kids thinking that Santa won't have anyone to pull his sleigh!

After all that walking it was necessary to have a sit down, so we visited The Chequers pub and kept our fluid intake up. Dik reminisced that the last time he had been in the pub 40 years ago the price of beer had just gone up from 1/6d (7.5p) to 1/10d (9p) a pint, which caused a riot.

After some more retail therapy, we returned to Dinkley Court and got ready for our evening meal at the local pub The Chequers in Burcot (pure coincidence - other pubs are available!). The landlord gave us a room to ourselves (although we weren't sure if this was for our benefit or the other patrons!). The meal was very good, accompanied by much pleasant chat.

On the Sunday we went our separate ways, although this mainly involved visiting The Cotswolds for some sightseeing and gift buying. We all met up in The Chequers for a drink before having a communal meal at Dinkley Court. Like last year, we had a wonderful huge kitchen that allowed us all to dine in comfort and style. Joy's homemade Christmas pudding was a great hit and disappeared fast.

Monday was going home day. Most of us visited the Bicester Outlet village on the way home for a final 'fix' of retail therapy.

All in all a great weekend was had and thoughts have already started turning to next year's jaunt.

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Dinkley Court, Burcot, Oxfordshire	The Thames at the bottom of the garden	The Thames	The girls in the garden	The boys (and buoys) in the garden
Chilling out in the lounge	Karaoke	Chilling out	It's a hard life!	The Old Quad, Hertford College, Oxford
The Hertford College Bridge, Oxford	In The Chequers, Oxford	Evening meal at The Chequers, Burcot	Happy Xmas!	The group shot outside Dinkley Court