Moving to North Norfolk / Gorgeous Evening in Cromer - 22nd Aug ‘19

As with most moving days, today was a glorious hot and sunny one.

Breakfast and then up and at ‘em. The pack up process ( minus Isabella) is a breeze and the current Mrs Pitts and I hurry through the process steps like a couple of old pros. On the road by 11.15. See my pros and cons list later in the blog for Hill Farm Darsham.

Straight forward journey around Norwich and arriving at Seacroft Cromer at about 1.15pm. We have a non awning pitch so with a bit of motor moving (the pitch was much too challenging for my current reversing competence!) we were soon settled. It’s a full club site so it has all the facilities- including a swimming pool! It is situated just off the main road on the Sheringham side of Cromer. The sea is about 1/4 mile away - over a road and another campsite.

After a trip to Morrisons to get a few provisions and a bite to eat we enjoyed a bit of sunshine sitting outside Brunnehilda. Kim read and I watched the Test on my i-phone.

Dinner was vegetable paella on the Cadac - absolutely scrummy. Made even more so as I made it - well under strict instruction from the head chef that is!

After dinner we set out for a bit of a walk - need to get the steps registered! We walked out of town to East Runton to get onto the beach. From there we walked along the beach back into Cromer. There was a lovely atmosphere with lots of folks BBQing on the beach. There was a gorgeous red sky sunset as well that added to the ambience.

Coffee and chocolate just by the pier and then up into Cromer town centre - just in-time to see the annual carnival parade through the streets. Nice idea to have it at night with all the lights.

We walked back home along the main road and were then treated to the carnival firework display which we watched from Brunnehilda’s front door.

Canasta was a bit of a walk over tonight but modesty prevents me from giving you the full details.

Hill Farm Darsham CL Site:
Pros:
1) Fabulous position for Southwold and Aldeburgh
2) Fresh eggs readily available
3) Our own personal water tap
Cons:
1) Road noise from very busy nearby A12
2) We didn’t have an awning pitch. Lots of room but not allowed to pitch on hard standing
3) Facilities - while they were clean (ish) they were far from pleasant to use
4) No view - could have been anywhere
5) WiFi, although free, was awful. And no 4G!

Lyme Regis - 2nd Aug ‘19

Well they’ve gone. The Vikings soon settled in to our peaceful way of life and, unlike the 10th century Anglo Saxons, we are gunna miss them! Laura headed north with an XC40 full of boys at 7.15pm. They’ve been great fun and well behaved but it’s only when they’ve gone that we realised that we’d  not truly relaxed for the last week. I can hear Laura screaming .. “welcome to my world”! We’re already looking forward to the next trip out with the boys later in the Summer holiday.

The day started in the normal relaxed way ... breakfast on the Caddy ( I didn’t perform quite as well this morning and managed to burn stuff!!), getting ourselves and the boys ready and then out at about midday.

We fancied Lyme Regis. We thought the boys would like the fossil / dinosaur connection and the opportunity to throw more pebbles into the sea.

They thoroughly enjoyed their time on the beach. All 3 of the boys went in the water which was really very warm and pleasant. The Twinnies also enjoyed helping find interesting rocks / pebbles - the highlights being one that looked like a shoe and one with a hole right the way through. Hey, don’t knock it, when you’re retired and 60 you get your excitement where you can!

An early tea at the Cornish Bakery was a good choice - for once a Cornish Pasty I wasn’t disappointed with! And of course ... more ice creams!

We found a fossil shop so the Twinnies stocked up with dinosaurs and Charlie got a few rocks. Just time then to get back to Brunnehilda, get Laura packed and on the road.

Kim and I christened the Cadac Paella dish for dinner - it was splendid. We had a quick walk around the village before a cup of tea and turning in.

Seems very weird not having the boys flying around our feet and making Brunnehilda buzz with noise and excitement. One good thing though ... no bloody Jurassic World on the DVD tonight!!!

A day in Clovelly- 31st Jul ‘19

It’s amazing how quickly a morning disappears!! Charlie and I slept in Isabella - the new camp beds were good. It was a little chilly in the night and the wind howled but we both managed to sleep well. Better than Kim did with the Twinnies thrashing about! We all woke at 8 and it was 1.30pm before we had had tea in bed, breakfasted (used the Caddy again!), washed up, ablutted, put a load of washing on, emptied the toilet cassette and took the boys for a quick bike ride.

We decided to go to Clovelly this afternoon. We didn’t really do our homework - I knew it was a walk down through the village to the harbour but I didn’t remember it being so bloody steep and cobbled! If we had realised we might have chosen more appropriate footwear. The boys did well and we got to the bottom, ate a pasty, had an ice cream, walked on the pebbled beach and got back to the top - all in a very enjoyable 3 hour stay. 

On the way back up the hill we had some caricatures done of the boys. These will embarrass them for decades to come! The guy was very good if not a little over assertive with both sitters and guardians! I suppose you need to be and he did a good job.

Back to Woolacombe for another game of Pirate Golf and dinner back at the Red Barn. This place is growing on me - the food is plentiful and good, it’s reasonably priced, the people are nice and, considering it’s so busy, they seem very efficient. Ice creams all round and then back to Brunnehilda.

Charlie didn’t  want to sleep in Isabella tonight so Kim and I had a manic 30 mins doing some packing up prep to make tomorrow morning just a little less stress full!

I’ll do a summary of the Damage Barton site tomorrow but in the meantime I thought I would summarise the highs and lows of our caravanning week.

Good - we got Brunnehilda set up safely and easily on quite a fierce slope.

Bad - I wasn’t happy with how Isabella. looked - not as tight as I would have liked.

Good - the awning light and carpet are great - good buys.

Bad - the inner tent and blow up mattress were a disappointment.

Good - we managed well with all 5 of us inside overnight. Not bad in a 3 berth!

Good - we slept in Isabella for the first time. Even in a gale force wind she stood firm!

North Devon (July / Aug ‘19) - Day 4

Perfect weather day today. Sunny cloudless skies and 24 degrees - also, the strong westerly wind seems to have blown itself out!

George, Finners and Charlie didn’t have a great night - turns out the second hand air bed we inherited has a slow puncture! Funny, the only thing we have not bought new for our caravan adventure is a dud!

George cooked a great fry up breakfast on the Cadac and the kids caught up on Jurassic World while we got ready.

Charlie wanted more body boarding so we planned a return trip to Woolacombe. Now, and here’s a funny story with a happy ending ...
I’m not a fan of going back to the same place twice so I looked at the map and found a nice place (with car park and shop) at the other end of the Bay - somewhere called Putsborough Beach. Kim has been caught out by my “risky” geographical decisions before so she was keen to impart the importance of the decision being a good one! Well it turned out the cliff road I was looking at was a dead end - a long car park called Marine Drive where the only way down to Putsborough was a 30 minute walk / climb down the cliffs with Twinnies, body boards, buckets, spades and Grandmas. Oh how we all laughed when we realised!! Anyway, as it turned out, we went as far as we could go with the cars down a track and stumbled across a steep but scalable and short(ish) path down to a perfect part of the beach with hardly anyone there. The weekend hordes were all at either end of the beach and we were in the middle - a classic case of victory bring snatched from the arms of defeat. Unsurprisingly, I modestly didn’t claim any credit for the turnaround in our fortunes!

Anywho.. we passed away a very pleasant afternoon doing all the beachy things but with much less people and more dogs than yesterday - what’s not to like?! Turns our Charlie is a natural at body boarding. The water temp and waves were about perfect. For swimming too.

At the end of the afternoon a clamber up the hot sand dunes and steep path was brightened up for us all by Kim falling flat on her face into the dunes!! Then off to Ilfracombe ...

Laura and George fancied proper seaside fish and chips before they headed home. Kim consulted Trip Advisor and we found s fantastic place called Lynbay Fish and Chips https://www.lynbayfishandchipsilfracombe.co.uk/ Lovely staff, perfect chips, gorgeous fish (I had hake!) and iPads for the kids to play with! Another success for Trip Advisor and defo a recommendation from the Pitts and MacArthur clan.

A Cornish ice cream cone with clotted cream whilst watching the boats in the harbour was a perfect end to the day.

Back to Brunnehilda for goodbyes and then Laura & George hit the road for the long drive home.
The Twinnies and Charlie played while grandma and grandad had an evening cup of tea watching the sun set over the Bristol Channel - or is it the Atlantic?!

Either way, all is quiet on the “Viking” front so we cross our fingers and go again!

North Devon (July / Aug ‘19) - Day 3

A bit of writers block tonight so this one is going to be a short one.

Early to rise and after a cup of tea in bed, Charlie and I went off to shower. Then to Sainos at Barnstaple to buy string and other assorted provisions. Of course it would be rude to leave without having some breakfast - so we did. Arriving back at Brunnehilda at about 12.15.

The Twinnies arrived soon after that. I equate the arrival of the Twinnies to a peaceful Saxon coastal village in the 10th century going about their simple relaxing life and then the Viking longboats appear on the horizon and their very existence is turned upside down. Don’t get me wrong, the Twinnies don’t rape and pillage but in their excited state their noise and activity settings do have a weird effect on the unprepared.

Much like a 10 day sea crossing for the Vikings, a 7 hour car journey meant a certain degree of pent up energy needed to be exercised. So once that was done and we had had a cup of tea we headed for Woolacombe beach.

Still sunny but slightly cooler than yesterday, we had a pleasant afternoon doing the normal beachy type activities - paddling, body boarding, swimming, rock pooling, playing cricket, building sand castles and then knocking them down. All this interspersed with a lot of running around and eating copious amounts of crisps!

We decided to try out the Cadac for the first time tonight. The resultant BBQ was splendid - although by now it was bloody cold on top of our cliff and the eating was a hurried affair half inside Isabella and half outside!

By this time the Twinnies were getting tired and, in a 3 berth caravan ( as lovely as Brunnehilda is) with a freezing cold wind blowing outside, there isn’t a lot of choice of things to do so it meant that everyone joins them. To be fair, I don’t think anyone was too upset to get an early night.

Harry slept with Laura on the dinette bed and poor old George was with Charlie and Finners in Isabella. The wind continued to howl and we all said a prayer to whatever God we worshiped - for a rain free night and that the Vikings could be assimilated into our simple way of life as quickly as possible with little or no bloodshed or loss of sanity.