Seperate Weekend!

Christine and I had a separate weekend as Jane had a Dressage competition on in Essex and Christine was having a “Girlie” weekend. As the competition was early Saturday morning I travelled up Friday with Sooty after we had a nice walk along the cliff top at Barton on Sea with Sooty & Bella and then finished with a cream tea, “lovely jubbly”
Up early Saturday morning as we had to have both horses loaded and ready to go at 0715hrs, ouch!!!!!!! Not being used to these early starts anymore, it was a shock. We arrived at the competition centre with sufficient time to get “Herbie” or using his posh name, “Urban Knight” ready and warmed up for his first class at 0835. Bearing in mind it was only Herbie’s second proper competition, he did reasonably well, in fact his score was good enough to give him second place, well done Jane and Herbie, and after all he is still only a very young horse. Unfortunately his next class wasn’t quite so good, he had had enough, oh well he can only get better.
Next up was Sky, this is one of the horses Jane & Dave bred and again it was only Sky’s second outing, unfortunately on this occasion Sky had a mind of her own; but as I said about Herbie, she is also a very young horse.
The earliest major they can now plan for will have to be the 2016 Olympics being held in Rio De Jareiro, we will have to start saving!!!!!
Christine:- I had a lovely quiet morning, showered, and then read some of my book, after lunch Michelle and Lucy came over, and we walked with Bella to Boscombe, we stopped for tea, but sadly after 30 minutes we were still waiting, so we gave up, and walked out, walked back to the Hotel and had a lovely cuppa there, and Michelle left with Lucy.  On Sunday Trace came over, we had a lovely evening, we decided on a weightwatchers meal instead of going out, opened the wine, and off we went, unfortunately the biscuits came out as well, so bang goes the diet again, still we had a good night catching up.  Next morning we walked over Hengistbury, and although it was bitterly cold it was brilliant, lovely to see you again Trace. Thanks for coming over.

 

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Welcome to ‘Bertie’

A quick look at Yellow Pages, sort out where all the local motor cycle shops are, put some postal codes in tomtom, and off we go. First stop was Boscombe, where we met a lovely lady, who told us everything we wanted to know about the rules and regulations of owning and riding a motor cycle.Fascinating!!
Next call was to book ourselves onto a CBT course (Compulsory Basic Training) apparently these days, we can ride a 50cc bike, but with L plates if I am on the back, well that would be ok, but we are not sure that any 50cc bike would be able to carry our weight, so we needed to look at something bigger. Booked on the course for next Wednesday, should be fun.
Onto the next shop, Geoff had seen this one on the internet, we walked in and it was chaotic, so much going on,the boss suggested to Geoff having listened to what we wanted that we went for a ride on a 50cc, well that was funny, Geoff looked so big compared to the bike, but sure it will be ok, but need more cc, when he got back a representative actually came and served us, obviously she was biased, but she was very helpful, she even made us a cup of tea and coffee, then she remembered a bike that was not in stock, and she showed us the catalogue, it was exactly what Geoff wanted, big wheels,110cc and light weight, which of course is very important when putting it at the back of ‘Hector’, not very stylish, but very practical. We only went out to look at what we could get, but have now purchased ‘Bertie’ to join us on our journey, should pick him up next week, so that we can play in the car park of one of the Hotels. Watch out everyone!!

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Family Day Out

Beautiful day, so we had some ‘weight watchers’ lunch, then Andrew Geoff,
Sooty, Bella and me, all piled into the car, off for a walk somewhere!
We decided to go to Sandbanks, half way there we decided to go to Studland Bay via the chain ferry. Had a lovely walk along the beach, with the dogs going mad as usual, tide was out, so we climbed over the rocks nearly to the next beach, very good. We then had a lovely cup of tea, with cakes, diet has gone by the wayside again. No will power.
Lovely winter’s afternoon.
Back on the chain ferry and back to Hotel, feel better for the fresh air, and brisk walk.

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‘Hector’ Our Motorhome

Arriving back in England we booked ourselves into Jane’s where we caught up with the washing, and Jane took the dogs out on lots of walks. Sadly Sooty hurt himself, and we ended up at the Vet’s, he has torn his pad, and is a terrible whimp when having his bandage replaced. 

We have been to Amsterdam twice now, have looked at many different boats in England and France, we have come to the conclusion, that unless we spend an absolute fortune we will not be buying a boat. We have looked at Wide beam Narrow boats, barges, power boats, Dutch steel cruisers, we have exhausted many brokers, and ourselves.

After long discussions we have gone back to our original idea of a Motor Home, we had spent a long time looking at these in the past, so when I spotted the ideal one, we said it was fate.

So off to Southdowns’s, we went and by 10.00am we had purchased ‘Hector’ a lovely Hymer, with all the gizmos., which we will be collecting in March.  
Then off to Derbyshire, where we are at present, Martin has set this new site up, and we are hoping everyone will enjoy our experiences, and hopefully make comments.
Martin has spent a lot of time mending the computer which had a virus in, when it was back up and running, I was able to get my Xmas present working, a pink Ipod, I downloaded all our songs on to it, and it works a treat, thank you Jeffers xx
We all went out for lunch at the Ashford Arms Hotel, where we had a lovely meal, we all had starters, followed by steaks, and then would you believe puds, the food was excellent, washed down with three bottles of wine, thank you Marian for driving us.

We are now going to have a lovely roast dinner, so much for the diets.
Thank you Marian and Martin for a lovely four days, we have thoroughly enjoyed our stay.

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The whisky shop visit

Marian had a plan, and we all had to be ready by 2.00pm, I was driving the car to Millers Dale, leaving it there, we then went onto Bakewell Station, where I was dropped with the three dogs, to walk to Millers Dale, it is a disused railway line, going through some beautiful scenery, the walk was roughly 51/2miles, and it took me two hours to do, could have been quicker, but the dogs kept running off in the beginning. I thoroughly enjoyed my walk whilst listening to the tunes on my new Ipod.

Meanwhile Marian had dropped the boys off  at the Weedram in Bakewell, Derbyshire sampling 8 different single malts. £150 spent – oh dear! They thoroughly enjoyed there afternoon, after they left the Whisky shop, they went over the road to a pub where they both enjoyed a couple of pints of local beer.

Marian had a meeting at the School, she then picked Russell up, met the boys, and we all arrived home almost together, a brilliant afternoon was had by all.

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New Years Eve

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New Years Eve at the Orchid, with Herbert and Liz and Kathleen and Tom, we had a lovely five course meal, then went to the Woodcroft for entertainment, we struggled into bed at 3am. New Years Day it was raining … Continue reading

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