Oh why can't we find a pub?

The other day when we went on our *little* walk to Strickland, we were trying to get to the Strickland Arms. Allegedly the friendliest pub in the county. The opening hours were every evening from 5:30pm and Wed/Thu/Fri/Sat/Sun Lunchtimes. Clearly, by going there on Tuesday lunchtime, we missed out. So, Thursday, Dan said, 'shall we try that pub again?'

Off we went to the pub 2.5 miles away...




When we arrived, it was CLOSED again. Bearing in mind it WAS Thursday, and the opening ours on the board said it was open on Thursday lunchtimes, we were QUITE annoyed! Dan swore. ALOT. We walked back to our little cottage...another 2.5 miles, obviously.

On the up side, we saw this brilliant sign on the way back....


Made me quite nervous that we were going to be mugged by them or something!!???

An accidental journey

Quite a few years ago, I was at my desk at IBM in Portsmouth and the phone rang. It was my friend Tina, so I picked up the phone and asked her how she was.

"Knackered" she replied, "I accidentally ran a half marathon this morning"

I was doubled over in hysterics! "What? How on earth do you *accidentally* run a half marathon? Didn't you notice?" 

I have to say she was a complete fitness freak and would get up at 5:30am every day to either go running or to the gym. The accidental half marathon had happened when she missed a turning on the Eastern Rd, and, after she'd realised, thought "sod it, I'm not going back, I'll run along to the next turning and go down that one instead."

Unfortunately, that bit of Pompey isn't particularly well furnished with roads - sea on one side and inlet of harbour on the other, so the additional 'block' that she ran added 6 miles to an already planned 6 mile journey. So it's *kind of* understandable. Saying that, I'd have just called a taxi! 

That phrase has gone down in legend amongst my friends. A classic from Tina, which exemplifies her single minded attitude to life, and fitness! But it, and she, sprang to mind today when Dan and accidentally walked 7 miles!

We headed off towards Great Strickland - a hamlet which we knew had a pub; we'd seen the sign pointing to the 'Strickland Arms' the other day on our meanderings towards Morland. We knew it was a smidge further than Morland (when you go the direct route) so just about 2 miles. Of we trotted. It was quite a nice walk, a not cold, not wet, not sunny, not really anything day, so, actually, perfect for walking. 

As we approached Gt Strickland, we realised that it was very much like all the little villages round here. A bunch of houses, but devoid of life! No shops, mobile post office in a van, but no PEOPLE! Very strange. Nevertheless, a we got to the centre of the main street, Dan saw the sign - Strickland Arms (pointing left) - and we trotted up to the door...only to be met by another sign 'Closed on Tuesdays' Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

After the intial disappointment, we spent 6 seconds exploring the rest of the village (4 more houses) and then decided to head on to Little Strickland, rather than going back along the pub-less route we'd come along. As we walked the next 2 miles to Little Strickland, we did consider that as Great Strickland had a pub which was closed on a Tuesday, there wasn't too much hope for Little Strickland, it potentially being (by definition) littler! 

We were right. About a dozen grim looking houses. No pub, no shop...but  on the upside, some llamas.

By this time we were too far round to be going back, so we decided we might as well complete the triangle and head back to Newby. A further mile and a half or so completed the circuit. Ooww my legs!

Where's the beer?

A bit of a longer walk - not on purpose though...!

So, another walk....




Definitely a bit further.

A Warm Welcome in Windermere

So, we set off for a nice touristy day driving around the lakes. We decided to head for Windermere as it'd been years since either of us were there. 

We had a lovely drive there, via Penrith and Keswick and particularly liked the road just coming out of Keswick and along Thirlmere. Gorgeous. 

We got to Windemere, parked up, and went for a little wander around the town to get our bearings and then choose somewhere nice for lunch. There had been some lovely pubs along the road getting here so we had those in mind as well when we were walking round. However a nice little cafe/bar/restaurant presented itself at one end of the town. It looked modern, sold cocktails, and had a long, thin, neon blue light embedded in the pavement around the outside seating area. I was sold. 

In we went. 

There were about 8 tables (it was quite small) about half of them were twos and half fours. The one to our left beside the door was for four, but it was empty, and clean. We looked over at the bar as you do when you walk in to an eating establishment. One waitress was dealing with a customer at the till. Both her and the customer had their backs to the door. Clearly a discussion about the bill was going on. The other waitress was behind the bar and didn't look up as we came in. 

A big sign over the bar said, "Table Service, Pay at the bar". OK I thought, we'd just sit down and someone would come over to serve us. We sat. And waited. The waitress from behind the bar came out from behind it...and disappeaerd into the loo. The waitress serving the customer at the till finished doing that (it had taken some time) and he came back to his table, next to ours, and him and his wife gathered their belongings and left. 

The waitress who went to the loo, then came out and looked like she was walking towards us, but no, she was wiping up the table and clearing away the plates left by the people who had just vacated their table. I was, at one point, less that 2 feet away from her. Looking directly at her and waiting for an acknowledgment; a nod in our direction, an 'I'll be there in a minute'. But nothing. 

At this point another customer came in and the waitress then came over to her, menu in hand, asked her what she wanted, and seated her at the table next to ours. Even then, no eye contact. She shouted the order to the girl behind the bar and went over to the table opposite ours to clear up. At the same time she was sort of looking over her shoulder at us in a kind of 'out of the corner of her eye, but without really looking' kind of way. It was quite odd and made me feel like we'd stumbled into something we shouldn't have.

So then we did something that we don't often do - we got up and walked out. After 10 minutes  of no eye contact, and serving customers ahead of us, it was clear we weren't welcome, or that we had done something to upset them, or 'done it wrong' in some way. I have no idea what it was.

All I can say is, what a lovely warm welcome in Windermere!

So, where *did* we actually go on our lost walk?

The Walk

We decided to head to Morland, the next village, for a bit of a drink at the pub. As we set off we saw a sign at the bottom of the drive saying 'Public Footpath Morland' and pointing accross a field. We looked at each other. Shall we? Oh go on then. We knew it was only a mile. So we crossed the first 3 fields with no problem. Each gate had the 'footpath' sign on it pointing through. 

We soon came to a point where the footpath went to the left and to the right of us along a field boundry. We knew the village was down and to our right so we turned right onto the path. This took us into the corner of the field. The other boundary of this field was a river, and the edge we were walking along met the river in the corner. Although we were sure we'd followed the footpath sign, there was no way out of the field at this point. It had barbed wire, double fences, and, oh yeah, the river! OK so maybe we'd made a bit of a mistake. We looked for another way out of the field...We followed the river boundary along to see if there was a crossing point, but there was a fence on both sides, with barbed wire, and really no way out. In the end we walked the entire circumference of the field, ending up where the footpath exited the field in the *other* direction. That couldn't be right.

We came round to the gate where we'd entered the field, and followed the signs afresh

towards the other side of the field. This time we were on the other side of the field boundary...just in case there was a way over the river there. But no exit. Ho hum. We did an about turn and followed the path back up to the road, which was completely the opposite direction to where we knew Morland was. We were officially lost.

Have no fear, we are the king and queen of technology, after a brief browse at Google maps on my phone, we realised that the road did lead (eventually) to Morland, albeit, the long way. We walked about 3 miles in the end instead of the 1 which would have been the direct route! Never mind, we knew there was a pub at Morland, so there was a purpose to our ramblings. 

The little village itself was quite cute (note the church with the praying squirrel outside it) and we found the Mill Race Cafe and the pub opposite which we'd noted on Google as being the nearest to our cottage. We decided to pop in for a pint. Initially it was a bit "Slaughtered Lamb" as all the people sitting at tables, the bar staff and the people at the bar were talking to each other. Clearly it's a very local local. But after a pint and a couple of bags of crisps, the locals seemed a bit more firendly! They did do food but we were a bit late for lunch and a bit early for dinner, so we're going to pop back at some point later on.

We decided to head home. This time we went along the main road ('main' being a relative term; it's single track roads around here.) This time we didn't get lost accross a field, and it only took about 20 mnutes to get back. It had taken us the best part of 2 hours to get there! 

Where on earth had we been?

   

Getting here and the little house

After a lovely lunch in Bromborough to get our holiday underway, we set of for Newby at about 2:30 on Saturday. We planned to arrive for about 4:30 and in fact were a bit ahead of schedule, arriving in the little village at about twenty past. Rather unlike me, I'd not printed out any maps, didn't have the directions, and didn't really know where we were going! What would we do without mobile phones...we gave her a call, and some quick instructions, a u turn, and 2 minutes later we were drawing into the driveway of Appletree Cottages, a series of converted farm buildings. We're in 'Garden Cottage' which is the teeniest tinyest thing you've ever seen. A 2 story bilding about as big as a double garage!

Downstairs there's a bathroom and bedroom, and upstairs is the lounge/kitchen area which has lovely views over loccal fields and accross to the hills. Very nice. But. It's like the woman who owns the place has gone mad with the ornaments, doilies, and chinz. There's not a single surface in the place which doesn't have a little statue, a dish or bowl with pot pourri, or a candle. In such a small place, the cluttered surfaces are overwhelming! She needs to see the HOUSE DOCTOR I think!

In addition there's a funny smell around the place! No it's not Dan's socks, or the Stinky Bishop cheese we brought with us. It's because she has a different glade plug in plugged in to EVERY plug socket! I can't stand it. It's like someone poured 20 different bottles of perfume on to the carpet. Anyway I've been switching them all off, hiding all the scented candles, and all the little scented pouches and sachets hanging in every cupboard. What is it with people who insist on all these fake smells? She must have some SMELLY tennants!

All I can say is what happened to good old fresh air??

   

This isn't me....honest!

Although it's usually Dan who publishes the links and videos on our blog, I couldn't resist when someone pointed me in the direction of this link. Although it's EXACTLY how I felt when my flight was cancelled in New York and I was told I'd have to spend the night there, I SWEAR it's not me!

I love work...

...I really do! In fact both of us do. It's kind of sad, but kind of good at the same time. We like to do a good job. We enjoy doing a good job, and we get frustrated when that doesn't happen. It makes for interesting conversations over the dinner table. Dan asks me about testing (he has to go through rigorous loops for the FDA on the boxes at AZ) and I ask him all sorts of things about the clever stuff he does!

However...

...holidays are good too. Without them we'd not be quite so keen, I don't think, to work as hard as we do. We'd probably not be as sharp or focused. I reckon we'd just not be as bothered!!!

Our next THREE hols are planned out already.

1) Cottage in the lakes (an open fire and a pub within walking distance are the 2 essential requirements when we do a search cottages4you.co.uk) there will be wine, food, LOADS of chat, I'll probably write lists, letters, blog posts. Ahhhhh Bliss.

2) Nice, an unspecified week with a weekend in Pompey at the beginning. We're thinking some more Pompey action, or possibly another cottage somewhere half way home - maybe cotswolds?

3) New York and Las Vegas - wahhhhhhh! I'm excited about NY, I've been on several occasions before but never this long. We can really relax, get into the time zone, walk all over the city, and generally make ourselves at home. Then of course, Las Vegas. I'm kind of dreading and looking forward to it all at the same time!

After that, well it's going to be Venice later on in the year! Not booked but definitely planned! How great are holidays?!

Valentines Shmalenties

I'm not a fan of Valentine's day. I don't really like the whole "being forced" to display your affection just because someone has decided that it's the day you should, and whilst I appreciate that the tradition has been around a while, I just don't like it!

http://www.meish.org/vd/card/someoneelse

Now that's not to say, I don't like the sending/receiving of gifts, surprises, and flowers and all that sort of stuff! I just don't like being told to do it to order!

I am spoiled though. Since Christmas I've received 4 bunches of flowers, 2 bottles of champagne, 3 surprise gifts, and my favourite dinner cooked for me twice!!

What a lucky girl!!!!

Snow place like home

Well Dorothy was right, there is no place like home! It's lovely to be back.
Apart from a bit of turbulence over the Atlantic, it's been a very uneventful, nay, tedious, journey. Just how I like them!

Left RDU last night at 8:35pm US time (1:35am UK time) and the flight was about 7 hours 30 minutes so we landed just before 9am UK time. I did manage to get about 4 hours kip (in hour-long bursts) during the night. I think that one of the worst things about coming back this way isn't so much the time change, but it's the shortened night....losing the 5 hours as you come over, that really does you in.

Anyway, as we were in our final half hour or so, we came in over Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight. It was very clear (see the pics), and then a minute or 2 later we were over snow. Better still were the pics I took as we flew from LHR to Leeds....there are some of recognisable landmarks made really clear with the contrast of the snow; Kirkstall Abbey, Armley Gyratory and of course the White Rose Centre!

Nice Food

Last time we were away in Raleigh, we got into a bit of a bad food habit. Breakfast, lunch and dinner, eaten out, every day. The food portions are REALLY big. Nice, but BIG. So this time I was worried about how I was going to manage NOT to eat quite so much.

Somehow, Chris and I managed to get into quite a good routine of firstly having a SUPER breakfast in the hotel...they have a breakfast buffet...with porridge, museli on top, fruit on top of that. As you can see from the picture....it was huge! However, we discovered then, that if we took a banana or a cereal bar from the buffet, and ate that during the day, that we would not really need lunch...OR...if we ate a late lunch (around 3pm) we'd not need dinner!

For lunch, a couple of times we went to a nice new sandwich shop which is just along the street from SMA's warehouse location. It's called Panera Bread, and it's a kind of Bakery/Cafe and makes and sells the bread that it uses to make the sarnies it sells. It's REALLY good.

We had a couple of butties, I had fruit and homemade lemonade on the side of the sarnie, Chris had crisps (their own brand) and dunno why they put a gherkin on the side of each sarnie (it was yummy!) As you can see from the pic my (Italian special) sandwich was HUGE. This one I actually only ate half and took the other half away for my tea! Chris had a very messy tuna mayo sandwich. That was yummy too. The second time we went there, Chris had a mediteranian vegitables and I had the chicken sandwich.

We love Panera!

Where am I?

Being away from home gives you plenty of time to think about things - and of course for me that means fodder for blog entries!

So, the last few days I've been thinking about the importance of home to me. Even though I looooooooooove travelling, I like coming home even more. "Home" is hard to define...! For example, it's not just my address. I can be living somewhere but it's not "home".

I have to be surrounded by my things, look, I can't help it, I'm a Cancerian!!! Let me quote

"...one of the strongest urges in this watery sign is the urge for security. For what's known and familiar, comforting and safe..."

Dan mocks me unmercifully for (a) the amount of stuff I bring with me when we go away and (b) the fact that I like to unpack it all and arrange it in the hotel room in order to make me feel 'at home'! In fact, I'm looking round the hotel room in Raleigh and seeing all my little bits and bobs around me now! Yes I'm feeling quite at home here...!

One of the things that is contributing to that though is that this is my second stay here. I knew it already, from the previous stay in August. Whilst I'm happy going to new places, I'm happier when I already know what to expect. I think this is partly my Cancerian nature, and partly just because humans are creatures of habit.

How many times, when you're on holiday, do you go back to the same bar, same restaurant, same beach? In fact, how many times have you been on the same holiday? When you have a limited amount of holiday, it takes all the guesswork and risk out of the equation. There's a guaranteed success that you'll get what you want.

But what do I do when I have to navigate the unknown, like when I was pootling around Brussels for my Visa? It's not like I want to only ever go to places I've been before. How do I cope?

Well I get an awful lot of info about places I haven't been to before just by doing a bit of gratuitous browsing. Also, maps help. What did I do before Google Maps, and the internet? Well actually to answer my own question, I collected alot of leaflets in folders, and spent alot of time ringing people to ask for information! My own personal interweb.

I remember feeling really really lost when 1st moving to Portsmouth. No car, no real 'getting about' skills learned at that point. Took me about a year to get my head round what I needed to do. The year *after* starting at the Poly, I joined all the student societies, went to all the freshers events, got bags of leaflets, timetables and info. I actually got the skills to organise and orientate myself.

Sometimes it takes a while to recognise my feelings of lostness. I just feel unsettled, and unhappy and don't always know why. It's usually not until afterwards, sometimes several years later, once I'm familiar with a place, once I feel 'at home' there, that I can look back and see where my distress stemmed from. So I can look back now and say that I saw those symptoms when I 1st moved to Portsmouth, to Leeds, and even on my 1st visit to Raleigh.

So where is home now? Funnily enough it's a place and a person! Dan is definitely part of where my home is. Although having all my bits and bobs around me helps; which is why we need a BIG house ;-)