Day 273 – FelixSurf, originally uploaded by DragonDrop.

Superb adventure driven weekend. After studying the weather with more than a passing interest on Friday (as I was guest writing about weather for a blog at work) I worked out that the East coast of Yorkshire was looking like one of the best chances of getting some nice weather in the North (the mid and east were looking rainy)

Pretty much as soon as I got in we set off in the van. No real plan – just head east – where the weather was going to be nice. I’ve got an OS map of the area and once we were not far off the coast I got it out and looked for a suitable place to free camp. Horcam Hole was spotted – I’ve wanted to check that out for a while so decided that would be the destination for the day.

Horcam Hole – a huge natural amphitheatre which legend tells us that it was created when a giant named Wade, a Saxon chief, grabbed a ‘handful’ of earth to throw at his wife, Bell – the soil missed and landed to form the nearby hill of Blakey Topping. Quite a breathtaking place. A nice place to camp over – even nicer as there was a lovely couple with their dogs who’d also had the same idea camped next door (safety in numbers and all that). The local constabulary came by a few times and gave us a friendly nod and wave.

After breakfast we headed off to nearby Goathland, where they film Heartbeat. Chocolate box top picture postcard little village that amongst it’s other virtues has got one of the best kids playgrounds we’ve ever come across. After letting off some steam there, we pottered about – ending at the ye old world steam railway station. This was like stepping back in time – the tourists (who’s numbers had greatly increased throughout the morning) looked very out of place.

After that, on a tip off from our camping neighbours we headed for Sandsend – just up the coast a bit from Whitby. We couldn’t of hit the weather better – by the time we got there it was a gorgeous day. We played in a lovely little pool on the beach, I sat in our portable ergo chairs (which come into their own for a trip to the beach), paddled in the breakers (as pictured up top) and generally had a lovely beached afternoon. After that, a bimble into Whitby itself, where we picked up a huge back of fish and chips and drove up to the top of the hill to eat them, looking over Whitby and the abbey. An walk round the abbey and it’s buildings (it had shut by this point, but you can see ‘it’ just as well from outside the perimeter wall.) followed by a drive home.

Still hungry for new things to do today, we visited Alborough Roman Town near Boroughbridge. Not something I’d have been happy to pay £3 for adults for but we’re English Heritage members so were able to have a look for nowt. The ‘museum’ was a small room containing a few artifacts found nearby and the main event were 2 floor mosaics. Beautiful arboretum surrounding the remains of the original wall though – some lovely trees planted in Victorian times and an incredibly pungent Jasmine. which was worth the visit alone.

Stopping off at Conyham hall on the way home for a cuppa by the river, I got to sit in our camping sofa (a phrase which, incidentally has ranked really highly as a search phrase for people arriving at DragonDrop) with my tree identification books learning about trees (a self improvement excersize I’ve set myself).

Eirene had cleverly left some lamb on slow roast, ready to eat when we got back. What a grade A weekend of adventure. I’ve chucked a bunch of photos from this weekend on my flickr site.

366 project – #7, originally uploaded by DragonDrop.

I’m still “on it” with my 366 days project. Here is sheet seven. 217 – 252..

click here to visit the set

1. Day 217 – green field, 2. Day 218 – Clouds like them off the end of Ghostbusters, 3. Day 219 – Hornbeam Park, 4. Day 220 – White pebble beach, 5. Day 221 – Fort Plog, 6. Day 222 – I’m mirrorblogging this, 7. Day 223 – LOOK OUT! floating things., 8. Day 224 – Pink Yellow Brown Purple, 9. Day 225 – Hat, 10. Day 226 – Dharma Doll, 11. Day 227 – The eyes have it, 12. Day 228 – River lobster, 13. Day 229 – Splitty, 14. Day 230 – Silver things, 15. Day 231 – Grey Dog, 16. Day 232 – Harrogate flower and cloud display, 17. Day 233 – Excited?, 18. Day 317 – Princess, 19. Day 235 – dodie pie, 20. Day 236 – Dragon Road car park fire 1, 21. Day 237 – mirror roof, 22. Day 238 – Fluffy, 23. Day 239 – auto geo tag experiment, 24. Day 240 – Friday night pint at the Regency, 25. Day 241 – Bongo and Lauren’s wedding, 26. Day 242 – Shopping list, 27. Day 244 – duck pie, 28. Day 244 – tinsel shelf, 29. Day 245 – getting married presentation at work, 30. Day 246 – new friend, 31. Day 247 – Snags and chips, 32. Day 248 – Felix and a wall, 33. Day 249 – Meat, 34. Day 250 – Bathroom wall, 35. Day 251 – Asparagus, 36. Day 252 – Website usability testing

Created with fd’s Flickr Toys.

A fantastico lovely weekend. It was our 8th wedding anniversary yesterday and we decided to celebrate for the whole weekend. Friday night, armed with a bunch of flowers I pottered home to the idea of a nice chinese and a DVD (simple pleasures and all that).

Saturday – morning was a bit hectic and Jaygo attended a birthday party. In the afternoon we’d been invited to a bbq party for our friends birthday bash. The rain started an hour before it was due to start and finished an hour or so after. Not put off though we had a lovely time in an out of town house’s triple garage.. All the small humans were loving the action on the covered bouncy castle (until Jaygo threw up all over it (poss thanks to the sweets from party #1 and the excessive bouncy bouncy)) Still we didn’t let spirits dampen. Eirene and I were fortunate to have a paintMonkey offer to babysit so we could go out and party.

A lovely party – we hooked up with the bbq party for a night time birthday bash. It was the crowd that we went to Ibiza with last year (2nd June visit). Loads of people we havent seen for a while and a bunch of new faces. Multiple celebrations and happiness abound, leading into today which is chill-o-rama content.

Went to see Yorkshire v Lancashire in the t20 cricket cup last night at Headingley. Stunning. That’s the best sporting event I think I’ve ever experienced in all my 34 years. What a game. I’ve heard the arguments over the years about “t20 will be the death of traditional cricket”. I’ve always been a fan or the purist version. the long game. The Tests. I’ve Always looked at the pajama clad counterpart as the anoying little brother of the game. But, armed with an open mind, I polled up and totally loved the spectacle.

t20 (‘twenty twenty’ – a 20 over each side game lasting only 3 hours) is now in command of millions of pounds, running a high profile and achieving global penetration even – America.(check out the Stanford Cup story about world sport domination and the like) I’ve generally err’d on the longer game side of the fence. I like the pace, the tranquillity and strategy of tests. The ebb and flow of it. It’s like the fishing of sports. t20 is more like cricket, minus the fisherman, replace with rockstar superstar DJ.

ANyhoo. I’m so glad I’ve got out of the office for the day. I did imbibe a half a shandy or two last night. ahem.

So last weekend we went on the first camping mission of the year.

We were all really looking forward to it. A party of 14 amassed on the campsite I’d sourced in what sounded like a lovely farm run site near Skipton (Cracoe, Threaplands Farm). I’d specifically asked on the phone if I could have a fire in a brazier type thing. The answer went along “yes as long as it’s off the ground”. Upon arrival the rudest woman I’ve met in a long time came steaming into our camp grunting “NO WOOD”.. no amount of “no but ahh but,” from my end would appease her. Upon enquiring if she was the owner of the site she told me that she “helps out” (although certainly not in the customer relationship management department I’d wager). After a lengthy chat with the lovely farmer Mr Wade who at one point saw sympathy to my obvious safety conscious attitude, the necessity for fire due to the inclement weather and midgies abound conceded, only to be interrupted by Linda the helper with her usual barks of NO WOOD.

Feeling less than happy about the whole situation we went through a not inconsiderable volume of barbecue fuel to keep warm. Hardly ideal. The next day we went out and purchased a large bag of coal, which we lit in a barbecue, off the ground. As we got accustomed to the odd experience of having a coal fire outside, we were told NO COAL. A joke really.

Every excuse in the book, from “it’s dangerous” (you don’t say!) – they had someone injure themselves, it’s bad for ashmatics (my own son is an ashmatic! and he was quite happily asleep in the van) to the people stay up late and talk until 2am (chea! that’s the idea!)

I wouldn’t of minded if I’d known from the outset that we weren’t allowed fires. Anyway – a fairly damp and cold weekend, emphasised by the distinct lack of basic human needs when living outside – fire. To me, a fire is an essential part of a campsite. Campsite owners should switch onto this fact (especially when, as is often the want of British weather it’s cold and damp) and look at ways of enabling this (Fire Marshalls? Only allowing qualified fire starters? (and we’d have to go on a course etc at our expense) surely there must be something that would keep everyone happy.

Anyway – apart from that, the campsite had the terrible “go to bed, it’s gone 9.30pm” type attitude. they pecked the heads of people nearby who had music on – we were the only ones in audio range and we didn’t mind in the slightest. They seeemed happy with the ‘arrive late, set of early’ walkers etc but didn’t seem to like people enjoying themselves, or indeed having a holiday. Would be a good place for a stop over – not a good place for a ‘holiday’ type setting.

Superb BBQ party was had last night. I set up my timelapse camera to take a photo every 30 seconds from 4 till midnight. (Here is the result)

Smashing time was had by all.(For Ali’s birthday, for want of an excuse). Lovely food (even though I say so myself) and lovely people.

Cool week all round. From Thursday I went to this website usability workshop followed by a wine and port tasting evening at The Yorkshire Hotel. Dirk Niepoort – the chap that was talking, was referred to as “Mr Port” and “The Rockstar of the Port industry”. A worthy accolade now that I’ve met him and his produce! A fascinating talk, great wines and ports.

SO hungover the next day. Made it into work (you gotta pay to play) and went round to an old friends birthday gathering on Friday night. Got to play Grand Theft Auto IV. It’s OK… but hmm… not quite up to the hype in my humble opinion. The next day it was all systems go for the BBQ as depicted!

Now we’re settling into a lazy lazy Sunday in the hot back yard by the look of things.