Darley Dale

This weekend we are kicking off our Camping and Caravanning Club DA season with the BCC (British Caravan Club) at their meet in Darley Dale, in Derbyshire.

We’ve stayed with other DA’s here before and it is a good base for the southern end of the Peak District. The field is big and flat and the Peak Rail steam railway chugs right across the end of it, and this is a fine thing to watch from the caravan window.

The only iffy thing here, perhaps, is the water pressure. The Aquaroll fill is very slow. You need the patience of a trappist monk not to flip out while waiting, but at least it gives everyone a chance to meet up and linger at the tap. Whenever I’ve found myself alone at the tap I’ve taken to packing my Kindle, for the chance to catch up on a novel or two. It makes a person very aware of the amount of water we use, though. As one person said to me while we were waiting: we take fresh water for granted. Imagine living somewhere where this is as good as it gets. Where mostly the water is muddy and diseased, dragged up from a well, and you have to make a ten-mile round trip with an urn balanced on your head to get it. Puts my moaning into perspective.

It started raining when we arrived. What else would you expect? Bank Holiday weekend. We splashed around in Bakewell for a while, then bought Bakewell pudding and brought it back to the van. Still raining. I can live with the rain. Plenty time for writing.

On Sunday, Matlock Bath seemed a good destination, but it was all Fish and Chips and amusements. A bit like Blackpool without the pier. I didn’t expect this. Matlock Bath is a Victorian Spa town. It should be sedate and elegant. Who decided it would look better with sad, half-blown strings of lights and binging whooping sirens from the one-arm bandits. Everywhere there is the smell of stale beer and salt-and-vinegar. Maybe it’s just me, though, because it was packed. But then we wandered into the park, which tracks along beside the river. The fish-and-chip smells faded, the arcade sounds receded and the short riverside walk was lovely. 

We crossed a bridge and came upon the Derwent Gardens, and they are a delight. There are flowers and moss-covered fountains and grottos and we spent a happy hour or so enjoying it. Only the time expiry of our car park ticket lured us away.

Looking for somewhere to eat on Monday took us to the Forest Garden Centre, also in Darley Dale. Garden Centres are often a good bet for food, these days. This one looked small from the road and we didn't expect much. The Tree Tops Restaurant was tucked away in a corner of the Garden Centre, a conservatory with good cushioned seating and excellent service. The clues were there - more than half the tables were reserved. The Tree Tops turned out to be one of the best eateries we've tried in a long time. I had Bree and Onion quiche, very tasty, but we finished with the home made scones. There is a notice in the cafe that warns about the scones. You can only have them in the restaurant, not take away, because of high demand. I had a cherry and almond scone, Sarah had lemon and ginger. We had half each and could not decide which was the nicer. Wonderful. This is a place we will come to again, and we will divert off our route to get here. It will certainly bring us back to Darley Dale, with the caravan, for another DA meet.

I'm writing this before venturing out into the Bank Holiday traffic. The sun is shining. We're weighing up all the options for avoiding traffic. There are few. It could be a long journey home but whatever, it will have been worth it.

London

With Sheila Kiggins outside Camping and Caravan Club Offices

Back from an exciting week in London. If there is a down side to any caravan holiday it is most often the journey home. This time was different, though. We called into Camping and Caravanning Club HQ in Coventry for a chat with the lovely Sheila Kiggins. Now, if there are two things I can talk about forever it’s Caravanning and Science Fiction, and you can read all about our talk on Sheila's Club People page of Camping and Caravanning Magazine, scheduled for the July edition.

Before the journey home, though we had a wonderful five-day stay at the CCC site in Chertsey, which we used as a base for coordinating two key things: For Sarah it was the set-up for this year’s SBA exhibition in Central Hall Westminster. (I helped. I carried stuff, and I suggested things like, put the big painting here and the little one there, and the artists smiled and patted me on the back and then did it the other way, the right way, without hurting my feelings.) Then, a couple of days later we were back for the exhibition opening, where the excellent Matthew Biggs of Gardener’s Question time was the celebrity guest.  For me, the big event was my first visit to the London Book Fair at Olympia. I hadn’t appreciated just how big this event was. I had my smart phone step counter switched on and realized later that I’d done nearly seven miles walking around the exhibition space. Seven miles! I kid you not, I got blisters. I went to some of the free seminars and also had a long and fruitful talk with the KDP people, amongst others, and have something interesting simmering away for release in the not too distant future.

The site at Chertsey is lovely. We've stayed there several times in the past, and this time we had a pitch that was only two or three feet from the banks of the Thames. Very restful. Getting into London, though. Sheesh! I hope nobody read my last Travelling in a Box post, because if you did, then I apologize. I led you astray. I claimed the train from Walton-on-Thames to Waterloo was cheap, using an Oyster card. It appears that the train from Walton-on-Thames is neither cheap nor within the Oyster zone. On weekdays there are staff on hand to do the wrist slapping. I won’t go into transport-geek details, but we think the best way to keep the price down is to buy return tickets to Surbiton, online in advance, and use a rail card to get some discount. If anyone has a cheaper plan that doesn't involve a day of cycling, walking or canoeing down the Thames, I'd love to hear from you.

A stay in Chertsey is not complete for us without a meal in the Kingfisher, just over Chertsey Bridge. We went there on our final evening. We love the place. Good food, rustic charm and not too expensive. A successful week, and one that had us on the go, every day. Now we just need to book a site where we can go for a rest.

Season Opener - Oxford

We collected our caravan from her pre-season service, in Derby, then took her on a short tour of all the more interesting roadworks. We were heading for Oxford, and what we imagined would be a short hop turned out to be a bit of an epic. A50/M1. M1/M6/A14. Two lots on the A443. Then the show-stopper, an almost two-hour delay on the M1 waiting to join the A34/M1 junction. Lovely.

A so-so photo of Radcliffe Square enhanced beyond all recognition and without prompting by Google. Thanks guys.

So we arrived at the Camping and Caravanning Club site, in Oxford, a little later than expected and a little more irritable than expected, but after a rushed pitch we headed out for the city. The walk from the site along the banks of the Thames, right into the middle of Oxford, is lovely. Didn't want to have to wait a whole day for it, so we set off in gathering twilight and walked back in the dark. Long enough in the city for a coffee and to get our bearings.

Saturday was a full day in Oxford. This was, for me, a day of academic study and learning. By study and learning I mean sitting in coffee shops amongst students and acquiring intelligence by osmosis. It was very much a mooching-around day with no agenda, but for February the weather was kind and Oxford is a fabulous city, and boasts some of the country's last remaining real bookshops. What more can you ask? Well, you could ask for an old ham, and even here Oxford delivers. The world's oldest ham, in fact, hanging in a butcher's in the market, with a certificate to prove it.

On Sunday London was top on the itinerary. We were unsure whether we should use the excellent Oxford Tube bus service or just drive to an outlying station. Our decision was made for us by our cargo, namely five framed paintings and twenty prints, to be delivered to Central Hall Westminster for one of @Flowagirl's  upcoming exhibitions. Not so easy on the bus, so we drove, instead, to Walton-on-Thames station where parking is free on a Sunday (and the trains cost buttons on Sundays with Oyster cards, too). We weren't in a rush. Couldn't drop the pictures off until four-thirty and didn't want to be hanging around London in the rain with half-a-ton of art, so I promised @Flowagirl a relaxing lunch in a posh eatery in this very posh part of Surrey, and took her to the cafe in Morrison's supermarket for two chicken Tikka's for not much more than a tenner. But come on, it was a posh Morrison's.

We came home on Monday, but only after a little reminder that February is still winter, when all the taps froze up on the site, and guess who forgot to fill the aquaroll between coming back from London and going to bed? There was enough water for Sarah to have a shower, but I had to pong until we got home. I could have used the site showers, but why waste the chance to feel just like a kid on holiday again?

So, a successful start to the year. I would highly recommend Oxford as an off-season site, and it's open all year round.

Where next? I love this. A whole year beckons.

2015 Caravan Season – The Prologue

So this doesn’t really count. The caravan season hasn’t started, not properly. Then again, we did hitch up the ‘van and tow her for nearly a hundred miles today, but we’re not staying with her. No, it’s that time of the year when she has to go in for her annual service. It’s hard doing all the packing and hitching and towing, and then not getting that first cup of tea in a grassy field by way of a reward.

To ease the blow, we decided to make a day of it, so after leaving our Sally Swift with the gentle folk of Derby Caravans, we did a spot of early season National Trust bagging with a visit to Kedleston Hall. This was a new NT for us, and we had to ask ourselves, why haven’t we been before. Because it's wonderful, and it’s not that far, really.

At this time of the year they are doing the conservation stuff, a little like the thing we are doing with Sally Swift, waking the hall up from a long winter slumber, rubbing her aching joints, prepping her in readiness for the 100k visitors who will trample across her 250 year old carpets for the next nine months or so. In many ways it is more interesting to see the nature and scale of this task than it is to see these old homes fully open and performing.

I have to admit, I struggle with the history. This might seem to be a bit of an odd admission from someone who’s been a member of the National Trust for fifteen plus years, but I will be honest, I find it hard to be moved by time and history and stuff, and I think it is because I just can’t get the time scales into my head. It’s too much. Too many years.

Then I start to wonder about how the hall might have looked back in 1765 when it was new. The marble floors were perfect and unmarked. There would have been a smell of paint and fresh plaster everywhere, a little like going into a Wimpy show-home but factored up a bit. The park would be, I don’t know, bare? Grassy with a few sapling oak trees scattered around, maybe with little cages around them to stop the wildlife nibbling. There are probably piles of building materials scattered around the yard, wooden scaffolding waiting to be collected by the local builders merchant. Everything is clean and new. This kind of imagining helps me some. I usually look at a National Trust home as being an old house where rich people once lived. But today I tried to see it differently, because for some of those rich people, Kedleston was once a modern home; empty bright rooms waiting for the first items of furniture, the first curtains to be hung, and the first ever logs to burn in the grate. Wow.

The domed ceiling above the saloon with its glass oculus 

Had to include this, because if ever I need to describe a very scary alien...

What makes for a good caravan site location?

So what makes for a good caravan site location? A fine view? Level pitch? Shelter from sun and wind?

Right now I'm in Weymouth, at a Dorset DA temp site. The big thrill for us was finding that it's only an eight minute walk to a big, bright, air-conditioned Sainsbury's.

So, yeah, I'm coming over a bit shallow here, I know, but really, the site itself has the other stuff, too: It's on a Rugby pitch, so it's level. It has an okay view - we can see the rolling hills in the distance. Protection from the elements? Well, not so much, but this week the main element is the unrelenting sun and I am not going to complain too much about that. We can also walk into the centre of Weymouth in about half an hour, so another big plus.

The site feels remote. It is quiet at night. There is no road noise. The birds from the nature reserve, next door, make themselves heard. Yet despite all this we have no need to use the car, and this is a plus for me, because I use the car way to much getting to and from the day job in the week. You need the car for shopping though, right? Not here, and this is one of the reasons we were so happy to find a place so close to a supermarket. We can shop on a meal-by-meal basis, and if we don't want to cook, the cafe in the supermarket do breakfasts and lunches for not much more than a fiver, and from the wide picture window in the cafe we can see Portland Bill and the coast. Wonderful.

Oh, and the other thing: we love Weymouth. The old harbour, the eateries, the network of antique shops that have sprung up out of the old dock buildings just below the Nothe Fort.

  Having a lovely week. 

        Wish you were here.

Easter in Delft

We're trying something new this year. We have come to Holland, staying with one of the Camping and Caravanning Club's International Rallies. Our camp site is on the outskirts of Delft, at Deftse Hout.

We're less than twenty miles from the ferry port at Hook of Holland, and given some of our recent European antics, with defective auto electrics and dropped exhaust pipes, this holds a certain attraction for me. Call me a coward, but once on site, corner steadies down, I have no wish to temp fate on the roads again until it's time to go home.

Here's the thing with Holland, though: cars are irrelvant. The Dutch know how to do public transport, and they know how to do cycle routes. Oh my goodness, do they know how to do cycle routes - this is bike heaven.

Anyway, first thing was to get here. We stayed one night on a CS near Clacton-on-sea so as to be on pole position for a nine AM sailing. We even rehearsed the twenty-minute run to Harwich the night before, which was just as well, because the road junctions round there have this funny thing where you can only join in one direction, the wrong direction, so we ended up clocking an extra forty miles getting lost in Colchester and then Ipswich. Even the sat nav seemed to make a Horlicks of it. Her normally calm and patient voice, I swear, became all strident and panicked and confrontational.

We got our ferry without incident the next morning, though, and settled back for a restful seven-hour cruise. Except it's not so restful, really, because once we'd had breakfast, before even leaving Harwich, I was casting about for something to do to relieve the boredom. The Stena Britannica is a big ship. Seriously big. But there's only the one deck available for wandering about. I didn't fancy seeing a film in the cinema (because despite the mill-pond crossing my innards were demanding I kept an attentive eye on the horizon) and at 10 AM it seemed a bit early to be thinking of lunch. I visited the shop and bought some beam deflectors, because I'd forgotten about them, even though I had no intention of ever driving at night. So then I got out my ipad, but found the queezy rumblings returned as soon as I took my eyes away from the sea. And on and on.

Lunch was excellent. I have to say the ship was spotless and the service was very good. We fancied a veggie dish and although it was on the menu it hadn't been pre-prepared, but the chef said it wasn't a problem, he'd knock something out and bring it over to us, which he did, and it was more than just knocking out a quck lunch, it was delicious.

We arrived at Hook of Holland late afternoon. Always a bit scary venturing out from a new port and getting to grips with wrong-side-of-the-road, exotic road signs, anti-clockwise roundabouts and everything else, all while towing. White knuckles should never be a part of the holiday experience. Strange how often they are, for me. We had our route plan, and we had our girl in the sat-nav box, who I have to say, was quite useless and quickly showed the stroppy side of her character. All the way along she insisted we "exit right", even though this instruction seemed to involve toboganning down the grassy embankment of a steep-sided dyke, because despite what she said, there were no exit roads. As each kilometre went by she became ever more snotty about our ignoring her advice. Well I'm sorry, girl, I don't want to drive down into a water-filled ditch. We had our map and we were sticking to it. We followed the official site directions, and eventually our girl-in-the-box went into a sulk, decided to stop belly-aching, and went along with our choice of route.

We found the site without incident, and a lovely site it is, too. English spoken on reception, in fact better English than my English. Then on to our pitch and a chat with the helpful folk who are the stewards for this rally. To cap it all, the sun was out and it was hot. It's Easter. We've brought all our jumpers and woolly hats and summer has gone and sneaked up on us out of the blue.

Chirk

This weekend we are the guests of Lady Margaret's Park. Sounds posh, doesn't it. We stayed here, a Caravan Club site, almost exactly a year ago for just one night, as a shake-down for our new 'van. On that occasion we were torn between staying with, and finding our way around, our new toy, as against the usual urge to get out and explore a new place. The former won out. There's only so much you can do in a one-night stay, but from the bit we saw we've been wanting to come back and do it properly ever since.

So this morning we did the canal walk as far as the Moreton Park garden centre for a spot of lunch.

It turned out to be an excellent walk, taking us across the Chirk Aquaduct, which we haven't done before. We've done the Pontcysyllte aquaduct, the other Thomas Telford wonder, in the next valley. Chirk aquaduct is different, though. Not so scary, but, with the rail viaduct right next to it, I would say it might be the more attractive of the two.

After lunch we retraced our steps and continued past the site up to Chirk Castle. This is a much better way to approach the castle than the usual way, by car. The walk through the woodland is gorgeous, and then you find yourself beneath a high wall, with no clue as to what's on the other side (unless you already know). Then suddenly the high wall is a castle. A real castle. It is mighty impressive. We arrived at a good time, late in the day, when the gardens were quiet. We had them almost to ourselves. From the end of the garden there is the most wonderful view out over the ha ha, and today was very clear. To the north we could see Fiddlers Ferry and Runcorn, then sweeping south was Helsby Hill, Beeston Castle and the Peckforton Hills, The Wrekin near Telford and even Wenlock Edge and the Long Mynd in the distance. It is a view that you can sit and admire for ages.

It is only just March though, and soon we were noticing the cold, and there is only so long you can sit around on a bench at this time of year. So we headed back.

Before we came away, Sarah told me she didn't want to walk too far because she is full of a cold, and I agreed we should take it easy. In the end we stomped over nine miles. It's that kind of place. Can't help it. There's always something else to see just around the corner. I reckon a weekend isn't long enough. This is a site we'll return to again and again. And it's only 45 minutes from home.