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Spring Holiday Part Seven - Mine, Castle & Country Estate

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A note from me - Apologies for this late post, which should have been published on Sunday, but I promise there is good reason for the delay! We were returning from Ireland, so we had driven from Bettystown in the Republic of Ireland, through to Belfast in Northern Ireland, before being on a ferry over the sea to Liverpool, before driving home to Southampton. It was a very long and tiring day, but I promise the pictures and stories of what we got up to there will be very much worth it, so watch this space!  We'd seen how beautiful Cornwall is, but I also wanted to see more of its history, both industrial & historical. And I'd managed to find out about Wheal Martyn, a former clay mine that is now an open air museum. How better to appreciate history than to see it in action! But as every great explorer knows, you cannot explore on an empty stomach, so we had a hearty breakfast of egg fried rice. I swear egg fried rice is like a superfood. It's got carbs from the rice, prot...
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Spring Holiday Part Six - Mevagissey & The Lost Gardens Of Heligan

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 Cornwall is one of those places where time seems to stop. It's probably one of the most laid back places in the UK, which I think is why so many people go there for their holidays. Including us! We made an early morning visit to Mevagissey, one of Cornwall's most famous fishing towns. It was gloriously quiet, and we felt like we had the place to ourselves! And to be fair, we pretty much did!
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Spring Holiday Part Five - Falmouth & St Mawes

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Falmouth is a bustling town, either in summer or in the relative cold of spring, and with a wide variety of things to do. There's plenty of little shops, in particular a good choice of book shops, as well as a selection of cafe's, deli's, artisan tat shops and much more. We had decided to do St Mawes first, so we found a parking spot, and walked down to the ferries, past this chimney, so called The Kings Pipe. It was used to burn tobacco that had been smuggled in but seized by the authorities as it meant they avoided paying taxes, and it was burnt as a warning to anyone else thinking of trying to smuggle goods into the country.
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Spring Holiday Part Four - Exploring Cornwall's Industrial Heritage

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 After a slightly disappointing visit to Trerice, we decided to find ourselves some Cornish Industrial Heritage, and wow, did we manage to find it! We started at Wheal Busy, one of Cornwall's many mines & industrial centres.  They are scattered across the landscape, and you're normally closer to one than you realise! 
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Spring Holiday Part Three - Beautiful Breakfast & Gardens

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 The day started well with a visit to Hawksfield Artisan Village. There's a deli there, couple of clothes & artisan shops, but the highlight was visiting Strong Adolfo's. I had an iced tea and a Mexican Brioche burger, and it was phenomenal. It was so tasty, not at all greasy, and was thoroughly enjoyable, particularly with the great views and friendly service we received there. It was very busy, but well worth the short wait we had. You can check out their menus & associated merch (James treated himself to a tote bag)  @strongadolfos.com . I promise you, there is no regrets eating here!
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Spring Holiday Part Two - Boscastle & Tintagel

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 We started off our first full day with a visit to the very pleasant town of Boscastle. If you're a similar age to me, and went to school in the UK, you'll remember the name of Boscastle and memories of the terrifying flood, that we learnt about in geography lessons, will come flooding back (excuse the pun). Heavy rains in August 2004 flooded the village, which sits in a steep sided valley. The amount of rain was extraordinary, and made worse by the so called brown willy effect (I assure you, that's no joke). The river became a raging torrent, washing cars out to sea, demolishing buildings & houses, and over 150 people were airlifted to safety. How no one died in the event is perhaps the most incredible thing, the emergency services were mobilised quickly and evacuated everyone. 
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Spring Adventures Part One - Beautiful Bude

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Spring was rolling in, and that meant a week off at the start of March. Me & James always try to take our holidays roughly the same time each year, with two weeks in October, ten days in late February/early March and a week in June. It makes it easier to plan, and means we've always got something to look forward to!  We decided to this time head down to Devon & Cornwall, places we've always enjoyed going in the summer, but this time in the spring to see what else we could find. Now, I'll just get my mandatory complaining about how long it takes to get anywhere out the way and then I won't mention it again.  It took forever to drive there. And I mean that, it felt like weeks had passed before we arrived. Perhaps I'm just not a very patient traveller. That's probably more to do with it. The four and a half hours (complete with snack & stretch break) were an eternity, but then we arrived in Bude. That meant the holiday had really begun! 
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February 2024 Part Three - Feeding the 5000 animals!

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Hi everyone! I was blown away that a few days ago I hit 70,000 views, and today I've seen that we've surpassed that and hit 75,000! All I can say is wow, I never thought this many people would ever visit and read my blog, so many thanks to you all!  The final week of February was altogether a less stressful time, thankfully! James had a couple of further check ups & was busy making appointments for further assessments. He was also being proactive and set about trying to make changes to his lifestyle to lose some weight and get himself into a better position health wise. Other news was that Russian Journalist & activist Alexei Navalny had been mysteriously poisoned. He was one of the loudest voices of criticism of Putin and his political empire, and for that face Alexei paid with the ultimate price. He'd already been poisoned once and managed to recover, but this time he was re-arrested, and put in another high security camp hidden away from the world, I think we all...
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February 2024 - Part Two - A scary event & a mystical church

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Hi everyone! Just a quick note from me to say thank you. I saw yesterday that the blog has now surpassed 70,000 views, and I am amazed by that figure! Thankyou all so much for continuing to visit the blog and read about my life!  February continued to be a busy month, and I made sure to try and have a quiet day off, where I spent most of the day at home with Husky, relaxing in bed, in front of the TV and snacking. Sometimes a day like that is good for the soul, you've just got to take it easy for a bit.
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February 2024 - Part One - Winchester Cathedral

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February is a strange month, in the fact it is both the shortest month, and it feels like the shortest month. Once you're a week into february you're almost at the end, whereas when you're a week into January you know there's still another nine weeks to go. Work was busy, and I had grown in confidence up to this points, and I was really starting to enjoy my job. However, it seemed it was not a sentiment that was shared. Our training group started with twelve people, and already we had lost four of them, that was a little startling! 
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