"One of those massive Catch Up Posts..."

Well i did promise oh so faithfully to update this blog as soon as i could with the events of the past few days. (Which have been absolutely awesome!)

I will therefore start at the beginning of the saga which would be Friday last week. Bank holiday weekend.

###FRIDAY###
We left sometime in the early afternoon to go to Paddington Station where we caught our train down to Chippenham. just for mum - "4:50 from Paddington" came to mind as i was reading a Agatha Christie at the time. It only takes about an hour and a half.

We were met by the lovely Laura at the station, who having just finished work "HurRAH" was going down a few hours after the rest of the party. We bundled into the little car and set off for a supermarket in search of rations. included in the weird items that i bought (that, by the way, feature later in this missive,) were a Jar of Vegemite, a bag of "still in their shells" peas, and a large box of beer.

The drive down was beautiful. Chris who was still feeling a little off slept the ENTIRE 3 hour journey down through some rather lovely countryside.

***3 hours later***

Three hours later we made it to where ever we were going in time for a BBQ dinner. (the party were well into 2 large crates of "Fosters" (of all things) when we got there.) Setting the tone for the weekend.
overall we numbered hmmm.... let me count..

Barbara
Mandy, Andy, Spike (the cutest baby alive), Bear - the puppy :-)
Katie, Andy
Anna, Kieran
Laura, Dan
Tony and bumble (the car)
Sarah and Matt
Dan
Chris and Me...

BBQ-ing out of the way, with the seaside breeze a -flowin, and the very pretty sunset going down over the paddock in front and the quaint city to the side, it was time for more beer and more clothes. Two hats, two trousers and a good measure of "blankie"

By about 12:30, i'm sorry to say i was colded out and followed those who were of to the land of nod, making a quick detour to the room of perpetual mud and grime... (the toilets) on entering our palatial tent ( no sarcasm there as it belonged to Barabara and Steve and was massive with two rooms) i fell asleep only to be woken many hours later by some funny gurgling sounds...

###SATURDAY###

....the funny gurgling sounds....
Happened to be Spike half escaping from his tent still in jarmies. I got the biggest smile ever and he started to crawl towards me (over the wet grass). At this point i went and scooped him up and didn't relinquish the little cutie till the end of the weekend. (sorry for stealing and monopolising Mandy...)

By about 9:00am we realised that the day was going to be "a stinker" a real summer day. We hadn't really had any till this point, but England pulled out the best day ever in time to make our weekend the best Bank holiday weekend ever!!! (Ok so i've only ever had one Bank holiday weekend...)

After much application of sunscreen, and finding of the coolest clothes we owned, our attention turned to two things. One - what are we to do today??? and Two - How to keep the beers cool during the day??? (Spike meanwhile was dribbling all down Chris's top and trying to pull his ear off.)

We eventually decided to go into the town (i mean seaside country village) and have fish and chips on the beach and eat ice creams and go for a paddle. Everyone had kind of split up at this point to do there own thing, but quite by chance we all met up again at the steam train station. Many of us by this time were well heading towards being "burnt" and it was soooooooo hot.






(back of the steam train.... i was sure Chris got a better picture...but no)



after a ride in the pretty little steam train, we bundled out and set off to the beach where we went for a paddle. Me - being shorter than everyone got soaked to my waist in a larger than normal wave. I ended up with soaking clothes for the rest of the day, which, apart from being slightly embarrassing, was nice and cooling.








( it was soooooo hot and soooo beautiful...ahhhhh precious....) sorry for LOTR reference:-)














Fish and chipped, we went for a beer, then an ice cream before doing the inevitable food and beer shop. I can't believe how much we bought. It took all the guys carrying crates of beer, boxes of beer, and some rum i think to get it all back to the camp site. (A portion of the liquid refreshments...)


****Next****
well i'm sure you can guess what happened next, beers were opened and people were sunburnt and hot. (spike continued his mission to remove Chris's ear and tried to get at every beer can he could find. We had to play " quick pick up that beer can!!!!!")

Our amazing "Chef de Cuisine" cooked us a wonderful dinner yet again and the sun went down in magnificent style and the woolies came out again.

Bumble at this point had an accident when he decided to explode in anger giving everyone a bit of a fright, however quick thinking on Tony's part saved the day (and Bumble) and we all lived to see another hot and beautiful day.

###SUNDAY###

yep - another beautiful day!!! who would have thought that England could do that!! (well after our past 7 weeks we were loosing hope...)

We hung around the campsite for a while deciding what to do. Some nursing sore heads, some nursing sunburn, and some crawling into the tent and scoffing plums while were distracted for 2 seconds. (Least it wasn't beer!!)

we trouped off to Tyneham eventually going in a road trip style, camper, the little Bumble Bug, and the "forbie". Tyneham, is a little village that has been stopped in time in the 1940's. Early in WWII the Army took possession of the area including the very interesting bay, to use as a training ground. The residents were given a month's notice to get out. They pinned notices on the door asking the army to treat their homes with respect as they wanted to return. They never did!! The army kept it. Today it is a village with no roads running through and everything except the church and little school is in ruins.

(this was taken inside the only classroom in the village school. I hope no one minds this photo of all everyone going on the blog, but i figured that no one is recognisable. I have the proper photos of everyone "grinning" at the camera if you want them)

****next***

We went off to Worrbarrow Bay, which is still army controlled, via a lovely little walk. It was hot and burny. very strange noises were coming from the pram as spikles loves bumpy terrain and the noise his throat makes when going over the bumps... We had to carry the pram down the rocky path and got to an unspoilt little beach. (no one is allowed to build there and it's only open when the army says it can be..)

we all went for a paddle and came and sat down on the beach burying people in the stones interspersed with popping stones out of a naughty little boy's mouth! Question - do the different stones taste different!!!!

Tired and hungry and in much need of a sneaky beer we walked back to the car in search of a beer garden, found one, and had a cheeky beer before going back to the campsite...for more beer... somepeople - who shall remain nameless - were rather worse for the beer having snuck into town to watch the game. Several pints later, came back to the campsite and amused us with a good show of "I really can't stand up straight" and "I only drank lemonade - i swear!"

more food was cooked by the amazing chef...

the next morning was pack up morning. which we manged rather well! Chris decided that it was a good idea to give a 'little" someone his vibrating pillow. It was dribbled on and Spikles was well impressed!

*******ok nearly there******

on our way home we detoured for ice cream and swapped emails and hugs several times before road-trippin our way home.

had yummy food thanks to Babara said goodbye to all and caught a national express bus home!!

**phew**

think i'm done for bank holiday weekend. Now i have to start on Hampton court Palace...think that can wait.

byeeeeeeeee

best laid Plans...

Well i know that in my last post i faithfully promised detailed pictures of Hampton Court, but after all my bragging about going we ended up not going. Chris, poor thing, woke up feeling quite unwell with a really bad stomach. He insisted that we still go...

After several attempts to stay in be we trouped off to the rail station but didn't get very far.

*enter London Tube*

We arrived at the tube station to find it closed due to emergency repair work caused by a slip on the tracks that happened over night. Great. Rush hour too mind... So we walked up to the next tube station, which im sure you can imagine was absolute bedlam with Three of the main lines from east london into the city out of action. For those that know london the district, circle and hammersmith and city lines were out. The only one available was the already overused Central line.

We were on the look out for a chemist for Chris but didn't see one on the way.

We cued up to get into the station and arrived on a platform about 10 deep in front of the train. this would have been ok if there was room for more than 50 people on each train (with about 15 carriages...) so we waited about 4 trains. people were pulling each other onto the tube and squashing each other in like sardines. Just because your feet were in didn't mean all of you was in as the door curve over at the top. so people keep getting stuck when the doors closed which slowed the process considerably.

about 4 trains later we made it onto a tube. As i'm short i ca't reach the bars in the middle of the train, and as i had no hope in hell of reaching the sides of the train i was stuck holding onto chris and trying not to topple into everyone else. I didn't even have the room to spread my feet apart for balance!

about 4 stops into the journey chris had to get off as he was (quite rightly) feeling rather unwell and hot. I had taken off my jacket and things before i got on but chris was still in a warm jumper and was overheating.

We jumped off at St pauls and eventually decided to give the tube a miss (and i told him there was no way we going to Hampton court and we were going to a chemist. ) We found a chemist and had some tea next door.

*enter shopping*

we found the street with all the second had bookshops and boarders books and spend the day reading. not a bad day all up.

came home about 3 and chris went to bed ( nothing unusual there)

It is now about9:30am and he is still in bed and says he is feeling better. a good thing since we are on a train today to Chippenham to go camping!!!

This brings me to another point! We are away for a couple of days and will have no Internet connection. Repeat. * NO INTERNET CONNECTION* until at least Monday night, maybe longer. We should be back on Wednesday - ish. we are leaving for France a couple of days after that though.

well that ends this missive.

better get packed for camping.
byeeeee