Holiday Day 4 - Whitby

The journey to Whitby was fairly uneventful with dry weather making the drive down the A68 easier than it might have been. When we arrived at Paul and Bev’s house we were met by Paul’s gleaming BMW 325; this decided Maria that our car just had to be washed to get rid of the grime from the last 4 days, however, Paul kindly said that he would do it, and a splendid job he made of it too. I almost felt guilty about letting him do it, but not quite! Anyway, brother and sister chatted the whole way through whilst I had a rest. He then took us for a ride in the 325, just to show us the difference in the ride, which is a little harder with the sports wheels, and a little quicker with the bigger engine.
Bev made a splendid Roast Beef dinner and all the family sat around one table and thoroughly enjoyed it. The rest of the evening was spent relaxing and chatting about this and that before we went to bed on a blow-up double bed. The only problem was that my 13½ stone outweighed Maria by quite a lot and she spent most of the night rolling on top of me - shouldn’t complain really.
Breakfast was a casual affair, after which Paul went to work and Bev took us for a ride around the area, visiting some places we remembered and some where we had never been. Once again, no photos -what an idiot. We ended up doing a little shopping in town and Maria came back with a half-price Vegetable Steamer; in fact Bev bought one as well so she and Maria are as bad as one another. Mind you, I bought an electric screwdriver and a “Platters” CD, so I cannot complain too loudly. We also bought some Yorkshire Ginger and Tea loaves, or Brack as they are called.
We have eaten one since we returned home and it was delicious.
After lunch we set off on the next stage of the journey - to Bradford. Many thanks are due to Paul and Bev for their hospitality and in the way they put themselves out for us.

Holiday Day 2 & 3 - Perth

After a casual breakfast we left Warrington, set the Sat Nav, plugged it into the charger, refuelled and set off for the 89th Halton Entry reunion at the Ramada Hotel, Perth. The journey of about 262 miles was a mixture of sunshine and dreadful rain showers but overall was not too bad. We were just entering the city boundaries when guess what, the Sat Nav screen went blank. More panic, where was the hotel (second moral from the day before - failed); I found a stop and plugged the Sat Nav in (properly) and we continued, finding the hotel with no problems at about 4 o’clock. After unpacking etc, we had time for the odd drink, meeting some of the Entry in the bar and swapping a few stories about the parking problems. Our room was fine but some had been recently painted and couples had to move rooms because of the smell, with one couple actually moving hotels for the night. We had a carvery buffet meal which was excellent and followed that with a few more drinks and some more talking before bedtime.
Saturday dawned fine and after breakfast we wandered downtown Perth for a look, prior to meeting up with friends who were arriving about midday. In that time we managed to buy a half-price Slow Cooker in Debenhams!
We met up with Dag and Virginia around 12 noon and spent the rest of the afternoon with them, including a drive around the local hills when I managed to fall asleep; it must be Dag’s good, sensible driving that does it. I did wake up to appreciate about half of the drive however and we ended up in Crieff where it seemed to be blowing a gale. It was here that Dag and I decided that we need to avail ourself of the local facilities. Having found the only public toilet that was visible, we then found out that it was very costly to use so, if you will pardon the expression, we paid 30p for 1p each. Then it was back to the hotel in time for a cup of tea, bath and change ready for the evening “do”. As I only took one photograph in all our time in Perth, I thought that I had better show you the best looking woman on show, so here she is.


There were, I think, 21 couples for the dinner, which I believe most people thoroughly enjoyed. Pete Bolton and John Boyack had done the organising and had come up with the idea of having a magician going from table to table to entertain. This was a splendid innovation and, even at very close quarters, he was very good and with a great line in chat.
After the meal we were invited to play “shove-pounds” to win a bottle of whisky and all the money that was thrown. Techniques varied but the best way turned out to be throwing, rather than sliding, as proved by Bill Butlin who won; he generously donated the cash, £45, to the North West Air Ambulance. I wonder whether or not I would have thought to do the same for the Cornwall Air Ambulance?
The end of the evening was spent in the bar catching up with old friends before retiring ready for the next stage of our journey the following day.
The following morning, we packed the car and had our traditional Entry AGM - did I really volunteer to organise a reunion in Newquay??

Holiday Day 1 - Warrington

The first day of our holiday was to negotiate the A30/M5/M6 to Warrington to stay with Gill and John who had very kindly offered to put us up and feed us for one night en route to Scotland. We set off about 10 am with the an address carefully entered into the Tom Tom. Having stopped a couple of times and encountered miserable weather for a large part of the journey, I noticed that Junction 20 on the M6 was coming up and this was where we were due to leave the motorway. At 70 mph, in the fast lane, the next thing I noticed was the Sat Nav had gone totally blank. Panic ensued as I negotiated my way into the nearside lane whilst trying to get Maria to connect the charger which would, hopefully, breathe life into the machine. A back up system at this point would have been handy, but we hadn’t bothered to write any instructions down!! Moral: have a manual back up system.
After a few attempts, the charger was plugged in and, although the map wasn’t on the screen, our lady guide was talking to us again so we managed to get off the motorway onto the right road and then I managed to stop and eventually press the right button so that all was working again. Moral: always have the charger plugged in whilst travelling long distances. After that it was fairly easy and we spent a very pleasant evening with Gill, John, Amy, Andrew and Jasmine, the latter three having arrived from Prestwick. Many thanks go to Gill and John for entertaining us so well and for providing a really great meal and drinks to match. Thanks to my meticulous forethought, no photographs were taken!!