Travurple

A 4 week blog, we have no excuses for the delay, we have been crap! Must do better!

Monday (21 July) We had another lazy day in Seattle, a walk around the local area including the local community farm, followed by lunch at the Stonehouse Cafe restaurant.

Tuesday morning. We said our goodbyes and headed back to the Seattle Amtrak train station, to catch the 35 hour train to Los Angeles.

Another interesting train journey, with changing scenery, as the Conductor put it “we don’t have WiFi, but we do have windows live…” look outside.

The train was delayed arriving into Los Angeles, so we stepped off the train crossed the platform and got on our next 45 hour train to New Orleans, instead of having 40mins in LA.

The ‘Cafe Guy’ on this train was a bit of a comedian, so there were a few funny announcements about the Cafe! This made up slightly for the fairly minimal menu, we did try most things in the course of our Amtrak journeys. It was the same menu on each train, but from different suppliers! Interesting how different a Greek salad or a Turkey sandwich can be from different places!

Lots more interesting scenery, and interesting fellow travellers (enough said!)

The train travelled through California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Louisiana.

You can see the ‘Trump wall’ from the train, at one point near El Paso, Texas the rail tracks run alongside the wall/fence. At the El Paso station stop, our cheery cafe guy announced that Burrito Sally would be on the platform selling her famous ….. you guessed it Burritos…. If we wanted to get off we would have time. After watching a fairly steady queue for a few minutes, including train staff, Nic weakened and headed off the train to chat to Sally and get a couple of Brisket Burritos. Well worth it!!

Overall Texas was not as barren and desert filled as expected, in fact we were surprised by its greenery.

We had left Seattle at 9am Tuesday morning and finally got to New Orleans at 8pm on Friday, a long train journey.

New Orleans was hot and humid, we managed a walk around the Garden Quarter, to see all the old colonial houses.

Our hotel was in the French Quarter, all a bit touristy, especially Bourbon Street, full of bars with music so loud you can’t hear yourself think, and that is from the outside!! We didn’t go in to any of them, fearing a burst eardrum! We are officially getting old!

We did find a nice cocktail bar in a hotel, and a really nice restaurant. Nic was delighted to get some vegetables on her plate!

Monday (28 July) back to the train station for another Amtrak train, 32 hours back to New York this time.

Not the best of trains this time, a cafe, but no ‘sightseer’ car. But still OK.

On arriving in New York, we walked a few blocks to our hotel, the Millenium Time Square Hotel, a bit of a line at the check in desk, but worth the wait as they upgraded us to a suite on the 51 floor, result!

Whilst Rog was queuing to check in, Nic booked a table for dinner at an Italian restaurant just over the road, we had a nice meal, then had a stroll around Time Square, it was still really busy.

Wednesday, we had a disappointing breakfast just down the block from our hotel. It was only 9am but getting hot already, we decided to head to the airport reasonable early. We upgraded our flight to premium economy again for a really good price, and it was definitely worth it!

Thursday, we landed early morning in London Gatwick Airport, got off the plane among to first passengers, there was no queue at passport control, and as we were travelling with hand luggage only, had no bags to wait for, we were through really quickly. We then had to kill some time before our booked train, so we sat in a Cafe Nero and had a couple of coffees/teas.

The trains up to London and on to York were uneventful.

We stayed in the cottage in Bielby again, spent the week seeing Family, including a couple of days out to the coast, with each set of parents.

We also covered the mundane, laundry, visits to dentists, hair cuts, unpacking and repacking.

Friday (8 August), we left Pock and headed to Norfolk to visit Rog’s old school friend. So obviously spent a couple of days catching up, including a lovely country walk, via a cafe!

Sunday, we drove down to Kent to see Nic’s Brother, via other friends near Ely.

Monday (11 August), spent a couple of days settling in, as we are house and pet sitting whilst they are away on holiday.

Also got the car air conditioning repaired.

Wednesday, Rog did the airport run to Heathrow, a round trip drive which should have taken 2 1/2 to 3 hrs, however due to heavy traffic and an accident on the M25, it took 6 hrs!

Friday, we got the train up to London, visiting the Bank of England Museum, an interesting museum. We had a lovely lunch in Padella, in Borough market. We then headed to the Globe Theatre to see William Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor. A hot day, so we needed to find some shade to stand in, great value for money as the standing tickets are a very reasonable price.(£6 each) They also have one of the most ornate water refill fountains I have ever seen!

Went for a beer at The George, the last galleried inn in London, owned by the National Trust, before getting the train ‘home’.

Saturday morning we visited Downe House, the home of Charles Darwin. An English heritage owned property, we got free entry with our Manx National Heritage passes, but had to pay £12.50 for the Greater London Ultra Low Emissions charge as the Volvo is old and a diesel.

Sunday, we had a lazy day.

Friday 11 July, we had tickets for the Calgary Stampede, billed as “the greatest outdoor show on earth”. It’s predominantly a rodeo including bull riding, bucking horses, chuck wagon races, bareback relay racing. But also includes a fun fair, agricultural animal show, craft stalls, lots and lots of food stalls and finished off with a stage show and fireworks.

Everything we saw about the Stampede said that the parking was crazy, and we had to drive in from our AirBnB, so we went early into the city, to a carpark a couple of stops away on the ‘Calgary Transit’ which worked out really well.

We had a long day, but a good day! The rodeo and events were crazy, the professionals trying to stay on a bucking bull for 8 seconds, and not get killed when they fall off is utterly crazy. They even start the children young, with a team competition, which seemed to involve them trying to catch a small pony by the bridle, only to be dragged around the arena !!!

Even the evening show was mad, there was so much going on on the stage at the same time it was really hard to keep up.

Saturday, we left Calgary for a 4 1/2 hour drive to Revelstoke in the Canadian Rockies, it is a stunning drive, via Banff.

In Revelstoke, we visited a couple of pubs/breweries, firstly ‘The Village Idiot’ which was a little too like a restaurant for just drinking, so we moved on to “Rumpus Beer Company” which was definitely more pub like, so we enjoyed a couple of drinks, and then some food from a truck parked outside.

Sunday, After only one night in Revelstoke we moved on to Kamloops, our AirBnB had a pool, so as soon as we checked in we hit the pool.

Monday (14 July) we had a vineyard and brewery tour, so nobody had to drive, we visited 2 Vineyards, Monte Creek and Sagewood and 2 Breweries Iron Road and Bright Eye, tasting plenty of wine and beer along the way. We ended up at ‘The Noble Pig’ pub with a couple of our fellow drinkers from Canada. We had a great day, and it was also a good choice to do as it rained most of the day.

Tuesday, We had a long drive back into The USA, there were warnings about a forest fire near the main highway, so we set off on our planned route, and monitored the situation, thankfully as the day went on the warnings were removed.

We crossed back into America at Nighthawk border crossing, we were expecting a small quiet crossing, and we were the only ones there, so we got straight through.

We drove to Winthrop, recommended by friends in the UK who had visited, we stayed at the AbbyCreek Inn, a nice motel by the river, and with a pool.

We had two nights in Winthrop, which is an old “western” town with covered wooden walkways. No surprise, we found another local brew pub, and spent both evenings having good beer and food!

Thursday, our drive was through the North Cascade National Park, back to Seattle. The views were amazing.

Once we got into downtown Seattle the traffic was awful, however we drove to our hotel, dropped off our bags, and friends, then took the car back to the airport. We had driven a total of 2,913 miles in three weeks !! More than doubling the original miles on the hire car when we picked it up.

After getting back downtown, via the Light rail system we went to ‘The Old Stove Brewing Company’ for drinks and dinner, it was crazy busy, and our friends had kindly queued up to get a table.

Friday, we headed to a glass exhibition by Chihuly, a famous local glass artist, we had seen some of his work in Kew Gardens a few years ago. We’ll let the photos speak for themselves.

We then had a few drinks at a couple of different bars, followed by dinner at Noi Thai restaurant.

Saturday, headed out to ‘Virginia Inn’ for brunch, then checked out of the hotel, thankfully we could all leave our luggage at the hotel. Our friends were flying back to the UK, but not until 8pm, so we wandered along the waterfront. Mid afternoon we said our goodbyes, and headed off to stay for a few nights with another friend, from our Central American trip last year, who also lives in Seattle.

Sunday, a lazy day, including brunch with friends of friends after they had competed in a Duathlon (Run & Bicycle ride). A great brunch with the “ best French toast in Seattle” !

Points for those of you who noticed in last week’s blog that we stated Chicago to Seattle was XX miles, obviously missed by the editor and proof reading department, obviously it should have read 2,063 miles!

Sunday 29 June, we had our first American diner breakfast experience, the portion sizes were huge, one of us managed to add vanilla flavour cream to coffee without noticing, and very nearly spat it out all over the table.

We drove to Spokane Valley to met friends of friends, who had, despite never having met us, very kindly agreed to put us up for a couple of nights. They were so hospitable, and for us a lovely experience to be made to feel so at home.

Monday, we had a short wander around Spokane, it was blisteringly hot again, so didn’t get too far. Had lunch overlooking the water falls in Spokane.

In the evening we went out for dinner at a casino, obviously we all had a little flutter with results ranging from surprisingly profitable to down right terrible.

There had been a shooting incident, over the weekend, where two firefighters were killed in Coeur d’Alene, not very far from Spokane Valley.

Tuesday, we left our hosts and headed to a place called ‘Big Arm’ on the banks of Flathead Lake, in the Flathead Reservation. As soon as we joined the interstate highway we noticed lots of people including, firefighters on every flyover and on the side of the road, they were all waiting for the motorcade returning the bodies of the fallen firefighters back to Coeur d’Alene. It was a very emotional sight.

Our 1 night accommodation in Big Arm was great, with lots of handmade wooden details, and views over the lake.

Wednesday, On leaving Big Arm we visited the Miracle of America museum, which had an extensive range of America memorabilia, cars, military, motorbikes, medicine, boats, it even had an alien section!! A thing to be seen!

We drove the 3 hrs to Butte, still in Montana. We stayed in the Rocker Inn just outside Butte. Butte is a old mining town which once had 82 mines, and still had an impressive open caste mine right in the edge of town, where they appear to be dismantling a very large hill. We had two nights in Butte, so managed to visit ‘The Butte Beer & Pizza Company’ which was true to its name. So we enjoyed a selection of beer and pizza.

Thursday, we wandered around Butte, tried to book a trolley bus tour, but they were sold out, but that is when we found out that the largest firework display in Montana was scheduled for that night in Butte, which is slightly odd because it was the 3rd of July, not the 4th, but they always do fireworks on the 3rd! Fortunately, we could see the fireworks from our hotel. Before the fireworks we had a few drinks and dinner at ‘Sparky’s Garage’ a sports bar.

Friday 4th July, we drove to West Yellowstone, a town just outside the Yellowstone National Park, on the way we were delayed by a road closure in Ennis for their 4th of July parade, I think we nearly managed to join the end of the parade, because everyone was still sitting by the side of the route.

In West Yellowstone we found ‘Big Gun Fun’ so, when in Rome and all that, we decided to go and shoot a hand gun each. Our friends shot a handgun each and semi automatic rifles. I think we all did OK and didn’t embarrass ourselves.

Later that afternoon there was the 4th of July parade, which consisted of various floats…. from a group of kids on their bikes, to the local airport fire engine soaking everyone! Lots of flag waving! A truly American experience.

Saturday 5 July, we drove into Yellowstone National Park for 3 nights, we are not going to try to describe Yellowstone here, we would quickly run of superlatives. So as they say a picture speaks a thousand words, so here are some photos.

Yellowstone is also our excuse for not posting our weekly blog, there was no mobile phone signal and our accommodation had what it called WiFi in the lobby, but it appeared as elusive as the bears! We did manage to see Bison, Elk, Deer, Chipmunks and Eagles.

Tuesday 8 July, we left Yellowstone via the North entrance and headed to Bozeman, which we’d heard of, from a passing reference in the ‘Big Bang Theory’ TV programme, so it was a good enough reason to stop, it also made sense in terms of direction and length of drive.

We did a little clothes shopping courtesy of Walmart, found a couple of breweries.

Wednesday, we had another long drive up to Shelby, Montana, which we had passed through on the train 11 days earlier. There is not a lot in Shelby, but we did find a Chinese restaurant, as we were craving a vegetable or two, and you can rely on a Chinese restaurant to do some good vegetables.

Thursday, we drove into Canada to Calgary, a 4 hour drive, the border was fine, we have to say we didn’t see any American presence, we expected them to check us out, but we now assume they are more concerned with checking us in. The Canadian official was very pleasant, however they obviously don’t get very many non US visitors as he had to go and find the stamp for our passports.

The Motorhome (RV) from Florida in front of us in the queue very nearly drove through the border without stopping!! Luckily for them they did stop, but had to reverse back up the the window, and take a considerable amount of time to find their passports, obviously they were not expecting to find a different country!!

Monday 23 June – we left York by train heading to London Kings Cross, on arrival we stored our luggage nearby (we are only traveling with hand luggage of 10kgs + a small ‘personal item’ Rucksack for under an airline seat). We then met a mate at the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, had a quick wander around the Gallery, punctuated by a coffee stop.

We were joined by our friend’s wife, and all had dinner at Maison Francois, before heading to the Royal Institution for a lecture on ‘The Poisons of Agatha Christie” by the author Katherine Harkup. An fun, interesting lecture on how scientifically, and medically, accurate Agatha Christie was in the use of positions in her books, we didn’t know she trained as a pharmacist in World War I and retrained again in World War II

A night in a Premier Inn at Gatwick airport, not the closest one to the airport, but with really friendly staff and probably the best Premier Inn breakfast we have ever had!

Tuesday, checked in for our FlyNorse flight to JFK in New York, we asked for a price to upgrade to Premium, the price was good, so we splashed out, glad we did. It meant we were off the plane first and early in the queue for passport control, after a 30 mins delay sitting on the tarmac awaiting a gate. From our expected arrival time, to getting through passport control, two trains and a short walk to our hotel in central manhattan took us about 2 hours 30 mins – we were stunned, we expected to be hours in the airport, but no.

We then met a friend for dinner, for our long term readers, it’s one of the Americans we shared interesting bus and train rides with, in the Balkans, on our Interrail adventures back in early 2023, who has since moved to New York.

We had dinner at a Korean restaurant, lovely food, and we decided to try a Korean drink. when they delivered a bottle and 4 small shot glasses, we were worried that it was going to be potent stuff, thankfully it was only 13% proof.

Wednesday morning, we headed to the train station for a 6:40am train to Chicago, a 26 hour train, 30 stops including Baltimore, Washington DC, Charlottesville (Virginia), and various stops in West Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, and finally Chicago in Illinois. The train was delayed at times for up to an 1hr 30mins because of the high temperature of the track, but made up most of that time overnight, so we only arrived in Chicago 30 mins late.

We had a good three hours for a very quick wander around Chicago, in 35 degree heat, to grab some lunch and fresh supplies for the next leg of our train journey, the 46 hr trip to Seattle on the ‘Empire Builder’ Amtrak train.

Chicago has a lot of impressive and iconic architecture, plus a nice river walk, even so it was damn hot !

The ‘Empire Builder’ is a double decker train, with half the train going to Portland and half going all the way to Seattle, XX miles as the crow flies. We spent a lot of time going through North Dakota, where there was a lot of nothing, wide open farm land with few towns. Into Montana, where the time changes again (our third USA time zone so far).

On the US railways freight trains have right of way, we saw many freight trains of 100 carriages, one of our fellow passengers was talking about freight trains up to 4 miles long.

Spotted a Coyote the side of the railway, but didn’t manage to get a photo. Also plenty of deer in the fields too. Not to mention a lot of abandoned vehicles, of all kinds.

The ticketing and seating is a very manual process on the trains, you can’t book a seat, once you have found one in the correct part of the train, (all the train is not going to the same destination) the conductor then sticks a piece of paper on the luggage rack above your head showing your destination, so he can let you know (or even wake you up) when approaching the station.

Slightly oddly the onboard cafe closes for it’s lunch break at lunch time, however there are no published opening times, you do get 15min notice announcement on the tannoy before it closes, that is if you can hear the tannoy, which is a little intermittent.

All in all, some of you may think 72 hrs on a couple of trains across America from New York to Seattle is crazy, but we enjoyed it. Seeing all the different scenery and landscapes, talking to some of our fellow passengers, just watching the world go by and plenty of time to write a more fuller blog than usual.

Saturday (after a short discussion, we agreed it must be Saturday) we have crossed another 2 time zones. After arriving in central Seattle by train, we got the tram out to the airport to meet our good friends from the Isle of Man, hire a car and start our road trip.

The airport was crazy busy as was the car hire depot, after having to run the gauntlet for do you want to buy extra insurance, a WiFi package, a tank of fuel – obviously the answer to all is No (we already have a separate car hire insurance policy, which includes ‘Supplementary Liability Insurance’. We then headed to the car park, the chap looked at the four of us and our luggage (not a load) and proclaimed that the proposed car was not big enough (we booked a Toyota Rav 4 or equivalent) and would we prefer a Jeep Grand Cherokee and obviously Yes pleaser this time.

We had about 1hr 30 mins to drive to our first stop in Cle Elum, we stayed in the Cle Elum Travellers Inn a classic American motel. Had few drinks and pizza in the local Brewery ‘Dru Bru’, a really good selection of tasty beers!

Monday 9 June – Whilst in Widnes, staying with friends we ate and drank a lot…

We also met another good friend from our Liverpool days, who we had not seen for a few years. And by coincidence they recommended a wine bar to meet at, which was also our host’s favourite place. We were not in their good books, especially when they dropped us off for lunch without them.

We managed a few good walks around the local Victoria Park, to walk off some of the excesses.

We spent some of time, when we were not enjoying good food and drink, arranging a road trip with our friends for later this year. No spoilers you’ll have to wait and see where we are going then!

After a great week, we drove back across the M62 to Pocklington, York, (for our non UK readers the M62 is a cross country motorway which goes through the Pennine Hills, the back bone of Northern England). We have used this route many times in the past, but this journey was one of the worst, with a complete closure, detours and lots of traffic. However, we had no time pressure, so it was OK.

In Pock we were in a new AirBnB to us, a nice homely flat, we think the host just moves out when she gets a booking, so it is decorated more like a home than your average AirBnB. We especially enjoyed access to a washing machine, and line, to get the laundry up to date. Fortunately the weather was glorious…. Good drying days!

So after our 7 weeks Isle of Man, Scotland, Bishop Auckland & Widnes road trip, we had a lot of unpacking and repacking to do, together with the usual catching up with family and friends.

We put up the tent to test the replacement tent poles, glad we did, as our tent is a ‘’Sendero 4’ they had sent replacement poles for a ‘Sendero 6’ so no surprise they did not fit! Bugger!

We did not have time to get the correct ones sent, so ended up at a ‘GoOutdoors’ store in York, asking for help. They sell replacement pole sections of varying diameters and lengths. So we bought some, and had to replace the snapped sections. Cutting them to size and Re-threading the elastic cord was a real pain, but we managed it! But didn’t have time to put the tent up to check everything.

During the week, a family member was taken ill, and ended up spending some time in hospital, but fortunately we were around to help out. Thankfully they have since been discharged from hospital.

One afternoon, on our way to meet with a friend for coffee, we took the Volvo to have it’s air conditioning ‘re-gassed’. This made a huge difference to the temperature in the car, during the very warm spell that The UK was experiencing.

On Friday 20 June, we drove to Kilnsey Park, near Skipton for a family wedding, the venue was in a field with a marquee, fire pits and mobile ‘facilities’, plus the possibility to camp, so it had a festival feel. We camped with our newly fixed tent poles, they worked!

There was a BBQ on Friday night, with the main event on Saturday, a ‘lovely do’ seeing family and chatting to the other guests. The weather was mostly kind, a few passing light showers that didn’t spoil anything.

Sunday 22 June, we packed up the tent, Sod’s Law as soon as we started we got rained on! So after the drive back to Pock we had to dry the tent off before packing it away.

Tomorrow (Monday 23 June), we start a new adventure, but that is for the next blog, so stay tuned..

Monday (26 May) stocking up at Tesco’s in Oban, and a very quick walk around in the rain. Obviously it is raining we are about to attempt to put up a tent, first time using a new tent in anger, we did put it up in a garden last year, just to check we knew what we were doing.

Got the ferry from Oban to Isle of Mull, a really busy ferry, it is a bank holiday! We were the second car off the ferry, an easy 20min drive to our campsite in Salen Bay, to put the tent up in the rain! It went fairly well, the kind Motorhomers next door made us a cup of tea.

Tuesday, we had pre-booked a boat trip to the Treshnish Islands and Staffa island, the home of Fingal’s cave. The sea was a little rough to start with, we were on the bow deck of the boat getting soaked by the spray, in our full waterproof gear, until they had to close that deck, so we went on to the outside upper deck.

The boat couldn’t dock on Staffa Island as work was being done on the jetty. We did get a great view of Fingal’s cave. Then on to Lunga in the Treshnish Islands, we had 2 hrs ashore, we have never seen as many Puffins, it was amazing, you could have reached out and touched the Puffins!

We returned to port, via the north of the isle of Ulva, which is our next destination. We could see our Bothy from the boat, it is in the middle of absolutely nowhere, we couldn’t wait.

Wednesday, we drove to Tobermory, most of the roads on Mull are single track with passing places, so you can’t get anywhere fast. Tobermory was an interesting little town, with a lovely little museum. All the exhibits had exquisitely written information, done by the founder of the musuem.

We had fish and chips for lunch. Then we drove around the north of the Isle of Mull, stopping at ‘Isle of Mull Cheese & Spirit’, we bought some ‘Whey Ski’ whiskey made from Whey!!

Thursday, we awoke to a flooded tent, there had been a malfunction with the tent door, thankfully this had not caused too much damage, however we did have to bail out the water with a wine glass! We then had to take the tent down in the rain and a howling gale, which snapped a couple of tent poles.

We then went for second breakfast and coffee at Glenforsa cafe, before driving to the Ulva Ferry, the storm was still with us! However after crossing to Ulva and having a coffee and really good chocolate Brownie in the BoatHouse, the storm had subsided and the rain had stopped, so we had a pleasant 5 mile walk to our off grid Bearnus Bothy, thankfully the owner will transport all your gear to the Bothy by quad bike, we needed a surprising amount of gear for our 4 night trip, sleeping bags, food, wine and other essentials.

The Bothy is lovely, off grid, no electricity thankfully it does have a flushing toilet! Sea views lots of bird song, 10 minutes walk to the beach. It is just stunning.

The Bothy is also our excuse for not being able to publish a blog last week.

In our first 24 hours we only saw the owner and one other quad bike pass the door.

Friday, the weather was kind today, warm blue sky and only a little breezy, so we walked the track to Gometra, the next island connected by a causeway/bridge. On Gometra there is a small community, however we only walked as far at the first building (about 3miles from our Bothy), with a little gallery selling jewellery, cards, Gometra stamps. We were met by Trooper, the local horse.

Saturday and Sunday, the weather was changeable, so we only managed a couple of short walks. The ferry doesn’t run at the weekends so we saw nobody, it was lovely.

Monday (2 June) we checked out from our Bothy, did the 5 miles walk back out to the ferry and the Boathouse, the restaurant, still on Ulva, being so close to the sea we had wonderful seafood.

Given the snapped tent poles (we did have a spare tent with us) and a forecast storm, we cancelled our campsite booking and checked in to a B&B.

Tuesday, we changed out ferry booking back to Oban, had a long days drive to Bishop Auckland.

Wednesday, we met an old friend and visited Bishop Auckland Palace.

Thursday, went to Durham, had a wander around town and visited the Cathedral, then Crook Hall gardens (a national trust property).

Our friend kindly cooked dinner for us.

Friday, we drove to St Cuthbert’s Church in Billingham to see the graves of Nic’s grandparents. Then on to Leyland to visit some family for tea & cake, finally on to Widnes to see more friends.

We are so lucky to have so many amazing friends and family that allow us to visit!

Saturday, a gentle start to the day after a couple of drinks last night! Then went into Liverpool to take friends to a black tie do, whilst we went to a Chinese restaurant and the cinema to see ‘Ballerina’ a spin off from the John Wick franchise. A very violent film.

Sunday, another lazy day.

Hope you are all sitting down….. two weeks and two blogs issued!

16 May – We left sunny Widnes, heading for Glasgow, stopping at Tebay motorway services on route, which is obligatory when driving north on the M6. A really good farm shop at Tebay.

Being cheap again, we booked a Premier Inn at Newton Mearns on the outskirts of Glasgow. Tickets for Kylie Minogue at the OVO Arena, a good show with a very diverse audience.

Before the concert we went for a walk across Glasgow seeing some of the old haunts, (Rog went to University at Glasgow Caledonian University 30 years ago). We have an early dinner at “Butterfly and Pig”. The menu promised much but failed to deliver.

Saturday, we visited the Falkirk Kelpies. Then Rosslyn Chapel (featured in the film ‘DaVinci Code’) an amazing 14 century chapel.

Then on to our accommodation in St Cyrus, 40 mins south of Aberdeen. An AirBnB flat connected to a family home, fairly isolated, and with stunning views.

Sunday 18th, we visited Glamis Castle, we were intending to only visit the garden and grounds, however the guy on the gate offered us access to the house as well at student prices, so we took it (at least he didn’t offer us senior prices!). The guided tour of the Castle was well done and really interesting. In the gardens it felt a little between seasons, spring flowers had gone over but the summer plants had not yet hit their best!

In the grounds they were holding an “Attelage”, no we had never heard of it either, but it was an event involving vintage carriage driving. Including a noise challenge, where they had to drive past a teenager playing to bagpipes! Another task was to drive the carriage to a stand holding a glass of champagne, the driver had to pick up the champagne and then drive a couple of metres further on before putting the glass down on another stand! Not as easy as it sounds!! All horses and carriage drivers were beautifully turned out.

We spent a good few hours wandering around. As we left the car park, there was an Oyster catcher nesting right in the middle of the car park.

Monday, we had a few admin jobs to do, it’s not all swanning about you know. In the afternoon we went for a short walk on St Cyrus cliff top and beach, it was a little windy, so we were a little sandblasted.

Tuesday, the wind had dropped, so we went back to St Cyrus beach for a much longer walk, along the beach to the nature reserve, then back on a path between the sand dunes.

Wednesday, we visited Montrose, had a walk around town, visited the Museum, (Museums or Art Galleries are always useful for decent toilet stops ! Especially as we often have our own coffee and sandwiches with us to eat in the park.)

We then went to see ‘Mission Impossible- the final reckoning’ at the cinema.

Thursday another day of jobs, re organising the car packing, and catering boxes, having looked at a long range weather forecast for our adventures next week to the west coast, we will need access to our wet weather gear, and the camping gear without getting everything else wet!!

Friday, we visited Stonehaven, about 20mins north from our accommodation. A nice harbour, we walked along the coastal path to Dunnottar Castle. We saw deer in the fields, and a weasel, near the war memorial, just hanging around, we have never seen one so close for so long.

Nic enjoyed another sauna experience, at a harbour side sauna in a converted horse box. Close to the sea for a quick dip. Rog had a beer at the Ship Inn.

Saturday, we drove north again to Aberdeen, had lunch in a Georgian cafe, found just through a Google search, delicious Khinkali. Then visited the Art Gallery and Maritime Museum, we didn’t linger in either but did a quick lap.

Had dinner in Zizzi’s before going to see Gary Barlow in concert. We may have inadvertently driven via the low emissions zone, we turned left out of a car park, when we should have turned right, obviously the Volvo is not low emissions, so may end up with a fine, we’ll have to wait and see.

Sunday, we checked out of our AirBnB and drove to the west coast via Huntingtower Castle near Perth, then Glen Coe, to Connel (just North of Oban). Had a nice meal and a few drinks in the Oyster Inn (luckily we got there early and managed to get a table, later they were turning people away).

Back by popular demand – or at least a couple of our readers have told us we are slacking and we are overdue another blog.

Our last blog was on 29 March, about 7 weeks ago. So this a quick round up of what we have been up to since then.

30 March – We spent another night in Troyes in France, a lovely old town!

We booked what we thought was an apartment with parking close enough to the town centre to walk. It was just that, however a couple of days before check in we got an email saying that the apartment was part of an ‘old folks’ complex, it was essentially the guest/Visitor accommodation in a shelter housing complex. When we checked in, it was obviously ‘tea time’ and the residents were all in the dining hall being served drinks. It was an experience. The accommodation was great!

Another 4 hour drive up to Le Shuttle to get the train back to England, thankfully an uneventful drive.

Once back in the UK we spent a couple of days in Kent with Family, then drove back up to Pocklington.

We spent three weeks in Pock, catching up with family and friends. So lots of eating and drinking.

We spent a few days unpacking all the skiing and cold weather gear, and repacking the car with summer and camping gear.

‘Camping Gear?’ I hear you question…. but you’ll have to wait to find out when/where we are going to use that.

One sunny (ish) day, We drove out to Spurn Point, a narrow Peninsula forming the north edge of the river Humber estuary. Rog remembered going as a kid and wanted to revisit it. The start of Spurn Point is not that far from Pock (52 miles or so) but given some small country roads and also navigating through Hull, seems to take a long time to drive there. (1hr 30mins).

Spurn Point is now a nature reserve run by the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust. The walk along is about 4km to the end, and another 4km back. Some of it on the beach, as the road was washed away a few years ago.

We had a couple of visits to Burnby Hall Gardens. They were just gearing up for the Tulip festival, so nice to see the blooms appearing.

Nic headed to Manchester for the weekend to meet up with her University friends. Did a great walking tour round Manchester, followed by an afternoon tea with bubbles. In the evening, cheese, wine and fire pits. What’s not to like !

Rog took his Mum and Dad to Harrogate for the weekend for the Harrogate Flower Show, and just a little break away from home.

27 April we headed over to Cheshire, to stay with Nic’s Auntie, Rog always ends up with list of jobs to do… don’t tell Auntie but he loves it really.

1 May, We crossed the Irish Sea to the Isle of Man to visit friends. We then managed to eat and drink our way around the island. Some old haunts and some new ones.

We visited the Archibald Knox exhibition at the Manx Museum (Archibald Knox is an early 20th century Manx artist/designer – amongst many achievements he deigned for Liberty), some beautiful jewellery, silver and art works. We also went the Sound Cafe overlooking the Calf of Man (an island at the south tip of the island) looking for seals, walked some the coastal path and had a a trip on the steam train.

It was lovely being back on the Island.

13 May, back on the Isle of Man Steam Packet’s fast craft ‘Manannan’ to Liverpool.

We got ‘selected’ for a vehicle security check, which was basically a few questions and a look in the car boot. Remember we drive a Old large Volvo XC90, thankfully they opened the boot, which was fairly full, they complimented our packing, didn’t move a thing and closed the boot again!

It was a beautiful day, and a very smooth crossing.

Kind friends are allowing us to use their home in Widnes for a couple of days, even though they are not there.

Noticed a tyre on the Volvo looking like it needed some air, however less than 24hrs later it was going down again, so headed to the local Kwik-Fit for them to check and repair, if possible. However there was nothing wrong with the tyre itself, it was a “rim leak”, and they could not do anything, except recommend a local alloy wheel specialist. So we drove straight there! After complementing us on the ‘nice tidy’ for her age (15yrs) in about 15 mins they repaired the alloy rim and got us back on the road, all for £30. What a bargain, it could have taken a lot longer and a lot more £££ to solve.

This is a short blog, as we have done much the same things, basically skiing and walking. But here goes for a little bit of detail:

Our last two weeks in the French Alps,

Managed a few good days skiing, the weather was better (for snow) than forecast. Daytime blue skis and cold nights, however it was still a little warm for the snow on the lower slopes, so we had to stay high for a better ski experience.

As there is no snow at village/valley level, we have managed a lot of walking down by the river.

Even Rog partook in the sauna and cold water dip, but only on one occasion, Nic has been going weekly.

Returned to La Sapinette restaurant, our favourite local restaurant, which thankfully is also our closest restaurant. Another really good meal.

Obviously spent some time packing up, we have both brought far too many clothes, and have only worn a fraction of them, however they all need packing up again. Note to ourselves, just because we have the space in the car, we don’t need to fill it!

Getting everything back in the car is like a game of Tetris, there is plenty of room for everything, but we do like to see out of the back window if we can, it just makes driving easier, especially on the wrong side of the road.

So we left the apartment on Saturday 29 March, a day earlier than planned, as the weather forecast was terrible. So rather than packing the car in the rain (or sleet/snow depending on which weather app you believe), we packed up and have driven half way up France to Troyes. This gives us a day to explore, before heading to Le Shuttle on Monday back to the UK.

We are in basic hotel in the outskirts of Troyes, we have just been for dinner, an OK American grill, in the hotel car park there are 8 cars, 5 of them are British cars and of those three of them, including ours are large Volvos!!

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As you may have noticed that our 2025 New Year’s Resolution, “must try and do a regular blog” , isn’t going so well.

So what has been going on since the 26 January, we hear you all cry ….

Well,  we flew back to Pock to visit family for a few days and celebrate a family birthday. Thankfully Nic could drive to the airport, and Rog was only in a sling and not a cast, as that would have made flying slightly more challenging.  

We returned to France, via friends in the north west of England and they flew back with us to spend a few days. Once we landed at Geneva Airport, we went to the CERN visitor centre, the home of the Large Hadron Collider. Two of us found it interesting and spent a while in the exhibitions.  The other two quickly went to the café.

Our friends do not ski, but took full advantage of the apres ski, (thanks for some of the photos). We had a lovely time showing them the local area. We booked an evening “Aperitif’ on the cable car, a round trip in the Vercland cable car with wine and nibbles. It was good fun (and we got 30% discount because Rog was one of the first 50 people to book our season ski passes back in September!).

We also went to Cirque Du Fer A Chavel, and up to both Sameons and Les Esserts ski areas for drinks. We also visited Sameons market, buying cured meats, olives and chocolate.

We enjoyed the relative quiet in resort before the French school holidays started, it was going to be busy for the next month.  We noticed there were a lot of British voices in the village. 

Rog had to keep his sling on until he was seen by the orthopaedic doctor at the hospital on 6 February, still unable to drive for a couple of weeks and told to do some physio. So we googled NHS Collarbone Physio, and Rog did those exercises. 

Nic has skied on a few days, the weather has not been great. There is currently no snow in the village,  they have been able to keep most of the ski runs open with manufactured snow, but the temperatures have not been kind with warm days, and not to many sub-zero nights.

We have walked regularly, usually around the lake and/or along the river, even without the snow it is a beautiful part of the world to spend time and recuperate from a broken collarbone.

Rog has read a lot of books, there are a couple of book boxes in the village, which get books in English, so we borrow them read them and return them. He has also done a lot of planning for our trips later in the year. So stay tuned for those!

At the end of February, we had some more family visited for a few days, who hadn’t skied for 30 years, and one of them had only ever skied once before, so we arranged a couple of private lessons. They did amazingly well, and we were able to ski a few blue runs together. Which was good, as Rog had been given the all clear to ski by the consultant, but told not to fall ! as the collarbone needs another few weeks to be fully repaired.

11 March – another activity included in our season ski pass was to sledge down the Marvel green ski run, we finally managed to arrange it as it only happens once a week. It was great fun, but it does say something that they only allow you to do to it on a sledge with brakes, and a helmet is compulsory (a helmet is not compulsory for skiing!) the snow was a little slushy so we got very wet. 

Nic has discovered the local sauna and cold water dip in the lake, she is currently addicted to it and going weekly.

The recent weather continues to be not great for snow, it has been really warm for this time of year.  There is still no snow at village level, but enough on most of the higher slopes.

Update 15/16 March it snowed at village level – it has mostly melted by mid afternoon, but that means there should have been a lot more up the slopes – we’ll go tomorrow to find out!

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