Monday 30 June 2014 - Summer Holiday - Day 4 - Verdun to Heidelberg

 

The campsite restaurant echoed to groans from a subdued Dutch contingent in front of an unseen TV. "Mex1" muttered a distressed man in orange as he passed our patio table.

Meal finished, we made our way to a window outside the crammed TV room. There were five minutes to go. Things looked bad for the Europeans to whom we had earlier sworn allegiance. Those five minutes proved very entertaining. We left our Dutch friends to celebrate and headed off down cycle track number 13  for a couple of kilometres,  returning in light rain from a seemingly clear sky.

The birds here at Verdun are as vociferous as those at Montreuil. One of the many delights of camping in such places.

After another fine sleep (we both sleep better in a tent than virtually anywhere else) sunshine greeted us, as did tea in bed and croissants from the campsite's local bakery. Excellent. 

Another leisurely departure saw us drive into Verdun for a quick look around. It's a pleasant town with a river and a citadel. We wished we had time to explore. Verdun would be a good spot to stay at for a few days - there's lots of walking and cycling and other stuff to hand, and the campsite is excellent, with good facilities including a pool.

Today's pictures were both taken near the centre of Verdun. 

A trip to a 'Cora' (think of Tesco Metro x 3) sorted out lunch, and we left the excitement of the retail park, complete with its zebras and camels, to continue our journey along an assortment of French byroads through small communities who farm in the pretty countryside. A massive field of sunflowers stands out in the memory. 

These small villages failed to reveal a coffee shop until nearly lunchtime, when a snack bar in Longeville-les-Saint Avold drew us through its doors. Our two coffees came black, with a bottle of milk. The milk was off. Our genial host disappeared for a while, returning with an abject apology. "My wife was making yoghurt out of that milk" he pronounced "This bottle will be better." So the coffees were replaced and everyone was happy. Here you can still get a cup of coffee (two on this occasion) for a euro.

Once in Germany we took to the motorway for the final part of our 190 mile drive to Heidelberg. 

The Satnav was very handy for locating Andrea and Thomas's apartment on Wilhelmsfelder Strasse, where tea and delicious apricot chocolate cake awaited us. A and T used to live a few doors away from us in Timperley, and kindly looked after our house and plants when we were away. Having abandoned the UK, in the process abandoning much of their large collection of plant pots in our garden, we have been forced to lure a homeless couple into our house as full time replacements for A and T (thanks Pam and Paul), and it's a pleasure to visit our old neighbours in their new home, where our European allegiance has now switched from Holland to Germany. 

Meanwhile, we enjoyed a 4km stroll down to the abbey at Neuburg, for an excellent meal and a bus ride back home.

Here's a slideshow for the day (13 images)
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Sunday 29 June 2014 - Summer Holiday - Day 3 - Montreuil to Verdun

 

It's great to wake in a cosy tent to the sounds of cooing doves and chattering blackbirds. Apparently it rained in the night, but the Hyperspace tent, built to withstand just about anything, was as oblivious to that as I was.

Today was spent mainly in the car, on a 240 mile journey avoiding motorways.

After calling in at Saint-Pol-sur-Ternoise for croissants from the Boulanger Patissier (Andrew Junior would have been impressed by the two lines of chocolate) and eating them next door in the Café de la Paix, we headed along quiet roads through occasional downpours past fields of white and pink, and past lots of water towers and newly installed wind turbines.

Diesel is €1.30 per litre, so if you are driving to the 'mainland' you'll save by waiting to fill up until you are out of the grip of UK taxes.

In the area that borders Belgium we passed lots of unsightly slag heaps, so we shied away from that heavily industrialised zone in favour of the poplar lined byway of the D643 road to Charleville-Mézières.

Lunch was provided by a roadside CoOp - baguette with cheese and tomato. 

During the afternoon we met a convoy of around a hundred caravans, mostly being towed by white vans. What was that!

A storm followed us for much of the afternoon, but it had dissipated by the time we reached Les Breuils campsite at Verdun. Another friendly, familiar and cheap spot where we can eat in the restaurant and form a 'European' alliance with some Dutch football supporters.

Today's pictures are at the campsite. The second one is the view from the empty chair on the first picture. So you can picture where we are. ..

That's it for now. If we do anything interesting during what remains of the day we'll report on it tomorrow, but 'chilling out' is the current name of the game, with Sue engrossed in 'The Little Old Lady Who Broke All The Rules' and me enjoying Khaled Hosseini's 'And the Mountains Echoed'.

Here's a slideshow for the day (12 images)
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Saturday 28 June 2014 - Summer Holiday - Day 2 - Wokingham to Montreuil

 

A lovely morning in Wokingham saw us bidding fond farewells to Jill and James and heading off to Woodley for my Saturday morning jogging 'fix' at the local 5km Parkrun. It was a fast course, resulting in my best time for a while - 21.35, only just outside my best. It's a shame that's my last such outing for over a month. Meanwhile, Sue went for a stroll around the course and shouted encouraging noises to some of the 235 joggers who had turned up to try their hands (legs, even) at this pleasant three lap course.

Coffees outside the Oakwood Centre, where I'm pictured, enabled any perspiration to vaporise before our (less tedious than yesterday's) 120 mile drive, via Ashford to collect some lunch, to the Chunnel terminal at Folkestone. 

If we'd known TGO Challenger Alan Sloman's address we'd have dropped in on him en route; luckily for him we didn't. (Hi Alan.)

As one who suffers from seasickness but not from claustrophobia, I find the Chunnel by far the most comfortable way to cross the Channel. Today we arrived at the terminal two hours early, but with their customary efficiency the Chunnel people got us to Calais within an hour of our arrival at Folkestone. 

After another pleasant 50 miles or so through French countryside littered with wind farms (I don't remember them from previous visits), we arrived in the flowery and ancient town of Montreuil, where we were soon in the familiar surroundings of La Fontaine des Clercs campsite and its friendly and memorably portly guardian. Despite having put our clocks on by an hour, we were enjoying a brew (again I'm pictured - wow, two pics of me in one posting - that's rare!) by soon after 4pm.

It's a lovely campsite, only €15 for the two of us including car and tent, situated just below the town walls. We strolled up to and around the walls - establishing via my Garmin gadget that the circumference of the walls, via the Promenade des Ramparts, is about 3km. At one end of the town is a 16th century citadel that was built on the site of an earlier castle. The lower image (if they all transmit) shows a view along the wall towards the citadel. Around the walls one species appears dominant - blackbirds, there are loads of them.

After walking around the walls, we took to the town itself. An interesting place with ancient cobbled streets. Dinner and beer was obtained from a small shop, and after a further 3km of wanderings we adjourned to the campsite for an alfresco meal in calm warmth outside the tent as we slowly lost the sun, which seemed to be synchronised with Chile and Serena, who at that moment both lost their respective jousts.

Here's a slideshow for the day (18 images)
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Friday 27 June 2014 - Summer Holiday - Day 1 - Timperley to Wokingham

Friday afternoon isn't the best time to undertake this journey, but we managed the 190 mile trip in Skippy in about five hours. Apologies go to Jill and James for arriving late and empty handed.

I know from a previous life that there are loads of good places to eat in this part of the world. Times haven't changed in that respect. The four of us enjoyed an excellent Thai meal in the restaurant above the Red Lion.

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Friday 20 June 2014 – An Evening Walk from Beetham

Last Friday Sue and I chose a lovely evening to set off from The Wheatsheaf in Beetham, through the colourful church yard.

The walk was due to start at 7.30, but with no others expected we started before 6pm.

Paths heading towards the Fairy Steps led through woods with deserted ruined buildings.

New signposts in this area comprise solidly built cairns with direction markers on the top.

Before long, we reached the Fairy Steps.

On a perfect evening, tea and cake with a view towards Arnside from the top of the Fairy Steps was just what the doctor ordered.

It's hard to descend without touching the sides. We won’t be seeing any fairies…

From Haverbrack there's a fine panorama with the Kent Estuary, Milnthorpe, and the Lake District beyond, with High Street and other Lakeland summits prominent in the distance. It's a sharp descent to the estuary...

... where a pleasant woodland path meanders beside the sands.

Oystercatchers and many other birds feed here.

We soon turned away from the estuary and up beside the River Bela.

Then it was on across the Deer Park and back to Beetham.

We soon passed another Cairn / Signpost.

There were plenty of deer and sheep about. We are just outside Milnthorpe here.

Soon we were back in Beetham, enjoying the last of our tea in the shade from the warm evening sunshine.

Here’s our route - 8km, 200 metres ascent, taking 2 hours. Highly commended.

There’s a slideshow with a few more pictures – here.

We go on holiday tomorrow, so I’ll be making a daily posting, wifi permitting, by way of a personal diary. I’ll try to make it vaguely sort of interesting, but given the need to keep on top of the writing (often done whilst enjoying a beer and chatting to others) I can’t guarantee anything. Your comments will be welcome, even if I don’t manage to reply to them.

Wednesday 18 June 2014 – Reddish Vale with SWOG

Sue and I have been attending (and performing at) Stockport Walking & Outdoor Group’s evening talks for several years. From May to August, they abandon Hazel Grove Civic Centre in favour of local meadows for their Wednesday evening entertainment. Tonight was my first visit to one of these outings, which are somewhat better attended than our own evening walks.

Simone was leading her first walk. We started by filling the car park at the Arden Arms but not going inside! Then we left the pavement beside Stockport Road, in favour of a narrow path beside the River Tame. Simone skilfully led us towards a deep bog that she skipped across without revealing the ‘dry’ route.

A traffic jam ensued. Thirty lost souls blinded by the sun.

As folk slowly fumbled their way through the undergrowth, a tree decided to wreak havoc with Howard’s spectacles. It snatched them from his nose and flung them away. It took ages to find them!

Soon we escaped from the bog and found ourselves in a spacious meadow full of docile horses. It was a lovely warm, sunny evening.

On reaching Reddish Vale Country Park, we admired this proud mother with her babies, and the mosaic outside the Visitor Centre.

The lake and viaduct shone brightly in the late sun.

We met someone who had felt he was walking on a moving carpet. For us, we seemed to be walking on bits of moving debris. Why was this stuff moving? It turned out to be vast numbers of these little creatures.

From the Visitor Centre we headed up to Hyde Hall along the Trans Pennine Trail, then back to our outward route and along the road to the pub, which had stayed open especially for us, not that it was particularly late!

We enjoyed some of Robbie’s Best, whilst admiring a lovely Stockport sunset.

A most pleasurable first (second for Sue) evening outing with SWOG, with a special thanks to Simone and Howard for providing the entertainment.

Our route is shown below – 7 km, 70 metres ascent, 1 hour 45 minutes. Simple.

‘A Pyrenean Adventure’ in New Zealand

I’m indebted to my old friend Geoffrey for this picture of Ruth with ‘A Pyrenean Adventure’ in Wellington, New Zealand. This certainly gets the award for the best travelled copy of the book. There aren’t many left, and rather than advertise them for sale, I’m slowly disposing of them to people who ‘really want a copy’.

The whole experience of producing and distributing the book was so pleasurable that I’d like to do another one. You’ll be one of the first to receive a copy, Ruth.

A Weekend with Grandma and Granddad

Hello, this is Jacob. I don’t think I have a Google account so I asked Granddad if he would write this report for me.

On Saturday Mummy and Daddy took me to Timperley, where Granddad found some old clockwork train sets. We found the keys to wind up the engines and put the track together. It was great fun watching the trains whizz around their tracks. Sometimes there were crashes.

The box for the set with the big green engine still had its price label - £2, 14 shillings and 7 pence. I have more money than that in my wallet, so I thought that sounded very cheap. Granddad told me that sixty years ago it was a lot of money. He said that in those days you could buy a house for a few hundred pounds, and a motor car cost almost as much as a house. Not many people had televisions, which were very small, with black and white screens. Granddad showed me an old payslip – in 1968 he earned just over £12 for 40 hours’ work.

After playing with the trains, and with some newer (but still very old) Lego and Brio, I made some Jumbles biscuits for Daddy. It was Father’s Day, you know.

My hand got burnt taking the biscuits out of the oven, so I went out into the rain to cool it off. Granddad had put a tent up. He told me it was quite new, only about twenty five years old. That seems quite old to me!

There was a duck pond in the garden that I tried hard to keep full of water with Fruitshoots recycled through my body.

Where am I?

Gotcha – I was in the tent. It was very cosy inside. I pretended to be a lion. I know there are no lions in Timperley, nothing to be afraid of, because the mouse in Grandma and Granddad’s garden has frightened all the lions away.

Then we made some sandwiches and went to Tatton Park for lunch. I didn’t eat my sandwiches, but I did enjoy a massive banana that filled my tummy. It fitted very neatly above all the biscuits.

There was a children’s playground next to the picnic bench.

Somebody glued my bottom to the slide.

At Tatton we went to a farm. It wasn’t far away – I went on my bike. There were chicks and piglets and lambs and goats and reindeer and lots of other animals. I fell over and grazed my knees. I found a room full of tractors and a fire engine. I tried driving them all.

That made me very tired, and my knees hurt, so Grandma took me on a journey.

We washed my knees and found a giant plaster and some more places to play. Then I cycled back to the children’s playground. I can ride a bike properly now. I am three, you know.

My final treat of the day was a ride in my hero, Lightning Mcqueen. We won the race, of course, with some very clever swervy driving.

Then Grandma took me home. I think Granddad had to stay in Timperley to cook tea for Grandma and Uncle Mike.

Grandma took a few video films – here they are if you are interested.