On the Road Again!

We had just got back from the Campers & Coffee event on Sunday and with the weather forecast leaning heavily towards "climate change disaster", i.e. sunny and temperatures around 20°C, so I booked a longish weekend away. I had a look on several sites to see what was available.  A few of the sites we like and that are independents, were fully booked. With overnight costs at two of them almost £50 a night, I wasn't that sad they were full. Good for them, but that's a lot of money. Another we like is a Premier Parks  site at East Fleet Farm near Weymouth. I actually booked through Pitchup.com and overall it was £37 a night. THis is for a pitch with EHU and fresh water on the pitch, hardstanding, full facilities and on top of that they have a bar/restaurant and a well stocked shop, not nly food but lots of camping essentials.  It was £6 cheaper than the Caravan Club site at Wyatt's Covert a few weeks before, and that had metered electricity! Wyatt's Covert has...

As there is still no football for me until February 22nd, when Arsenal host West Ham United, and it's still too cold for a fair weather biker like me to be out and about, I thought that we should look to go away again. There is a lot of debate about the costs of the Caravan Club sites and so I went through the usual booking services and then on Google Maps to look for a site to go to for a couple of days.  Amazingly, those that are open aren't that different in price to the Club sites.  In the end I booked us two nights at Hunters Moon near Wareham in Dorset. In fact many of the "independent" i.e. not Caravan Club sites were more expensive.  Maybe if you want a bar and entertainment then the higher costs are okay! It's about a three hour trip to get there and so we need to be away a lot earlier than usual. So far I have paid the £5 deposit and the rest to pay on arrival. With the Club sites you know roughly what to expect regarding quality and cleanliness.  The t...

Had a lie in this morning. We were always going to have a lazy day of reading and dog walking. As it was sunny we got the chairs and new table out. We even gave the wind out awning a few minutes air time before the snapping of the wind had us rewind it. So not much to report. We had a longer walk over the fields to get a better view of Chesil Beach. The Fleet Lagoon was full. With the tide in it saved us walking along the shoreline ankle deep in mud.  So apart from that we did very little. Our 175 on pitch The last one is chicken pie cooked in the RidgeMonkey. 

We left home about 1050. Loading up was easier and I added the small table and chairs to the underseat locker accessible from the outside. All in the hope that it would be sunny, or at least warm enough to sit outside. The first problem was before we arrived at Ashford. Some total dick thought it was a good idea to close the M20 from J10A to J9 London bound on the Sunday of a bank holiday weekend. Yes folks. These people walk amongst us every day. Traffic had to go through the centre of Ashford. Guess what the original name of the M20 was called? Yes. You guessed correctly - The Ashford Bypass. It took 25 minutes via Hythe Road A20 to rejoin at J9. Traffic at walking pace if you were lucky. Once free there was little holdup until the M25. A couple of slow bits where we almost came to a stop. As such we decided to miss our usual coffee and Reggie pee break at Cobham and to continue to Fleet on the M3. Around this area there's roadworks in several places. They are widening the carria...

Sadly this trip isn't purely a pleasure trip as part of it is so Claire can attend the funeral of her Uncle in Salisbury. I had planned to get away over the May Bank Holiday weekend anyway. Part of the weekend, Saturday, sees Arsenal at home against Chelsea. A "can't miss" session. So I was looking at Sunday onwards. I checked the places we like and none of them had any pitches free for Sunday onwards. Salisbury is about 150 miles from home. It's a bit of a long way in one day. We also need someone to look after Reggie. He's not the easiest though. We could go in the Moho and see about parking later. The church looks to be near the Cathedral and it's double-yellows everywhere. So when we got the funeral date I looked for a site near Salisbury. The Caravan and Motorhome Club have a site about 10 miles away.  I think a site would be better as there's facilities rather than CL's where we would have to use the onboard washing facilities. So I have book...

Although I haven't quite tied up Day 2, I thought Day 3 might be easier. It's the drive down from Back of Beyond to the Garden House in Brixham. The problem is to fill the day. We have to be out from the camp about 10am. Can't  check into the Garden House until 5.30pm. There are a few places of interest I'd like to squeeze in. Clouds Hill, the last home of T E Lawrence - Lawrence of Arabia. Just down the road is a monument. I always planned to stop at Dawlish Warren where we had many family holidays when I was a kid. I last went there in 1976. More to add to fill up over 7 hours. Hopefully the weather will be good enough to park up and take in the sun.

So far we have booked a couple of nights on the way down to Brixham, where we have the holiday stay. But what about coming back? As we will be in the Motorhome-with-No-Name (to be known for now as Van) we should be able to knock the miles off easily enough.   But as we walked the dog today along our familiar stretch of the Royal Military Canal we decided to look for a camping ground on the way back as well. I had a look for some scenic areas where we have been before and would like to try again.  I saw a site on the club site  right alongside the Fleet Lagoon on the Dorset Jurassic Coast.  I had thought of one night after we leave Brixham but the site seemed to only allow booking for minimum of two nights.  No problems I thought.  It will mean Friday and Saturday nights in the Van. The site is called Eastfleet Farm . It's not a club site but affiliated.  So that will cost us £66 for two nights including the extra fee for Reggie for the pitch for t...

We were up early for the ride to Poole to get the LD Ferry to Santander.  Packing was done the night before. The Touratech bag to go in the larger pannier, waterproofs and spare gloves in the smaller and the rest in the Givi bag in the new box.  The TT bag fitted pretty well into the body of the pannier leaving the lid free for another smaller bag, that is home to the sponge bag and the chargers bag!  Packed and ready. We were away at about 0935 for the 160 mile ride to Poole. I hadn't filled the tank after last weekend's ride to Colchester, so the first stop was Tesco at Ashford to fill up. Pay at the pump wasn't working again. Grrrrr. Once away, the M20 and M26 were free flowing until the M25 but even the eastern end wasn't too bad. Then it all clagged up before Cobham Services. We pulled off for ten minutes to give Claire's hip a rest. TomTom saying we had 108 miles to go. It had taken an hour from Tesco.  Then it all went downhill! Rejoining into four lanes of c...