(Kent)

Okay, so I wasn't quite as successful in Ashford as Oadby. In fact, I came dead last. But, you see, it's not the winning, it's the taking part, and by doing so badly I probably made everyone else feel a lot better about themselves, so in a very real sense, I'm a winner.

Ashford is a strange kind of place for at least two reasons - it calls itself "Ashford (Kent)" to excess, for one. I walked past the Working Men's Club when I got there on Friday night and the sign outside says "Ashford (Kent) WMC". Would people really not know which Ashford they were in if they looked up at the sign and it only said "Ashford"? For another thing, I found when I daringly decided to walk from the station to my hotel that Ashford is some kind of magical land where however far you walk in any direction, you always end up in the same place at the back end of the town centre. After quite a lot of that, I got a taxi like some kind of big city fat cat.

Fun tournament, though, and lovely weather. I even walked from Charing Cross to St Pancras, taking in all the places I was intending to along the way, on my way back. And without once getting lost. It's official, I can cope with London streets now. Perhaps with a bit more practice I'll get Ashford (Kent) too.