Bristol and a secret location in Birmingham

The SS Great Britain in Bristol dry dock

We’ve settled into the routine here very quickly, two laps, two cats. Coffee in bed is ‘Tinsel time’ the rest of the day is ‘Millie time’

We’ve been into Bristol twice now, once just for a mooch and yesterday because I found the tickets for the SS Great Britain that we’d bought when we were last here, valid for free entry for a year, so till the end of this week! A good trip around the ship, a walk along the river to Wapping Wharf, a mall built of container units, for a yummy lunch. Across the bridge to the Cathedral, and up George Street to the Georgian house, as recommended by Iain and Bev’s neighbours who I had a good chat with the other morning! Most odd walking up the street, we both felt we’d been before, we have been known to forget these things, though in this case I think the street was actually reminiscent of the street in Glasgow where the Rennie Mackintosh museum is, as we hadn’t been before. An interesting snapshot of a well-to-do house, though they have had to rewrite some of the information as much of the money was made in the slave trade, so very non pc at the moment!

Going underwater (not really!) The lower half of the SS Great Britain is in a climate controlled environment to stop further corrosion of the iron ship (the first ever made in 1843, by Isambard Kingdom Brunel)

We’ve been for a couple of walks, one round the coast and through the marina at Portishead, which was quite gentle, and one from Portishead to Clevedon where we stopped for an ice cream and got the bus back. This wasn’t quite so gentle! A good walk though.

So here we are 'underwater' looking at the quite corroded hull. The upper half is open to the elements and has been painted in corrosion resistant paint, however the lower half has salt bonded into the iron which attracts moisture and would continue to corrode even if painted. The only solution was to remove moisture from the air, a very expensive on-going cost

Dressing up in period costume

We went to the cinema to see Top Gun Maverick, which we thoroughly enjoyed, I saw the original in Bangor, twice, as a student, with the same bloke, not that it got me anywhere with him! We always say we must go to the cinema more often, particularly having bought our car insurance through compare the meerkat (other insurance agencies are available) as two for one makes it a good trip out! Meant to go to Jurassic Park today! Oh well, next week!

The big excitement though was last Saturday, our first Commonwealth games rehearsal, at a secret location in Longbridge! Rehearsals go on regardless of weather, shame about the downpour as we turned up! We had no idea what to expect, all we knew was we were in group MAR. As we queued chat turned to MAR meaning Marshall, and my, along with many others, heart sank. Are we just going to be supervising the athletes arriving? No we are performing, it says so on my ID card. There seems to be quite a lot of confusion, I knew John, one of my ex colleagues from the BBC, a real boffin, who does a lot of lighting and sound for plays had a role in production. I didn’t expect to see him so was pleasantly surprised as he walked past for his second shift as a seamstress! This was not a role he was expecting. We were split into groups and taken outside, a bit of a warmup, then four areas for different sorts of movement. We did only manage three of the areas as we got sent home early due to a plumbing problem making the toilets unusable! Can’t tell you much, as then I’d have to kill you, but suffice to say, having got a bit down beforehand, after rehearsal and then watching a YouTube vid of some of the marshalling activity at the Glasgow games, we are very excited again. We will be right amongst the action and in the arena for the longest time apparently, though we still don’t know doing what!

Brians attempt at recreating the famous photo of Isambard Kingdom Brunel

The recreated propellor on the SS Great Britain, made to Brunel's original design. Not only was this the first iron steam ship ever built, it was also the first ship to be driven by a propellor rather than paddles. The inventiveness and genius of Brunel!

Bristol cathedral and park on a sunny afternoon

Along the 6 mile (10km) coastal path from Portishead to Cleveland

At our first Commonwealth Games rehearsal at Longbridge, Birmingham

Jackie gets her bib and number for the day along with headphones and receiver to be able to hear individual instructions

Brian's ready too

Here we are being led out to our practice area. Notice the puddles, there had been a rain shower, but we'd been warned rehearsals would go ahead no matter what the weather was. Where is this secret location? We can't say, apparently its to stop paparazzi descending on the area

One of four areas of different movements

Pow! Yeah, lets go for it!

Since we are housesitting (and have actually spent a lot of time with these pussy cats) here's Millie cat asleep on Brians lap

And a sleeping Tinsel cat

Back in Alvechurch UK and to hard work

A cleaned Big Ted back in his storage area

Who thought sleeping near Portsmouth and then driving to the Midlands on Good Friday would be a good idea? Well we were wrong, unsurprisingly it was a hideous journey back to Mums.

Helen and Ian popped round in the afternoon to bring us “box no 2” from their loft, 4 bowls, plates, mugs, glasses, knives and forks etc, and kettle and toaster. Important to be able to provide tea to tradesmen... Waved them off, did a little unloading of Ted before mum arrived and it all ground to a halt. First curry, we’d planned and booked, know we are home now.

The bluebells at Lickey Hills

Saturday was transport day, empty Ted before going to the storage to give him a shower. First we checked on the car, the car that has been sitting alone, and unloved for 6 1/2 months guarding Ted’s space. There were no birds nests in the engine compartment, there were 4 round wheels and amazingly it started first time. Phew, huge sigh of relief there. Three hours cleaning Ted then!

Mother and daughter heading to the summit fort at Lickey Hills

Easter Sunday was a scorcher, and neither we or mum had plans so we went for a little walk at the Lickey Hills, looking at bluebells, before returning to roast a leg of lamb. Not something I’ve done for a long time, very traditional, and though I say so myself very yummy. He was a good lamb, he’s been hot, cold with cauliflower cheese, biryani’d with chickpeas and today finally shepherds pie. 12 meals? Can’t be bad.

Look at that for a leg of lamb!

A leg of lamb wouldn't be complete without Jackie gnawing on the bone

Monday we planned administration, but actually went to see Sarah and John, to pick up the post we needed for the car insurance and ended up chatting for ages which was lovely.

Tuesday we could finally get in the house, we’d found some likely keys and walked round with Helen and Ian on Friday, but didn’t seem to have a full set, so we hadn’t been able to gain access, so this was is, was it really going to be as bad as we expected? 

A sad looking bathroom that needs ripping out and starting again

The kitchen was as expected, and needs changing, the bathroom was worse than expected and needs changing, the carpet through downstairs and the stairs and landing has been down at least 26 years and needs changing, the decoration that I did pre Brian needs changing so yes, we have our work cut out. We met Paul, the contractor who works with Colin our letting agent who seems lovely. He’ll do the kitchen, and bathroom, we’ll strip the wallpaper, and do the garden and whoever finishes first will do the decorating.... we started today, dado rail off, carpet up, to check on the floor which feels a bit weird but is actually fine and living room walls half stripped. From tonight we are staying in the house so we have no excuse not to get up and at it tomorrow....

A quite big lounge/diner that wasn't too bad, still with Jackies old baronial decorations. Its already half stripped from this

Lots of work needs doing in the garden

The final countdown (we know a song about that!)

Our table at the SMC Annual dinner: John, Pauline, Julie and Emma

Tired and emotional, well tired anyway....

As per the last entry, Sunday Tea club was fab as ever, it may have sounded strange to have a ChineseTakeaway on Friday but as much as we were in China town, once Crystal has worked her magic it’s not like any meal you get from the takeaway.

Monday Big Teds door fix went very smoothly and the warranty paid up, downside to the speed was they then didn’t want the van anymore, so we had to remove it to Mother’s drive a day earlier than we were hoping. It does fit, so all is well. 

Monday curry with Tim (L) and Bill (R)

What we didn’t know was whether the warranty had paid up, Brian found his main bank account had been blocked by the bank themselves. Quite a large sum had been paid in, the proceeds from selling a flat he had bought some years ago with his business partner. He had than paid money out into a new account for him, and a new account for me. Mine however he had immediately forgotten the password for, so having paid money in, so he thought, he couldn’t check, until receiving a new pin through the post! The main bank however saw this as ‘unusual activity’ so blocked this transaction and the account until he went and presented himself, with documents, at a branch. Just as well we weren’t in France yet!

Our campsite at West Harling (location: 52deg 25'51N, 2deg 54'45E)

Monday also involved a trip for me to the Physio to look at my tennis elbow, just to confirm my self diagnosis and to give me some exercises to make it better. Fingers crossed they work. We then went into the main post office in Birmingham to buy some international driving permits, just in case of a no deal Brexit in March, the AA has said our normal drivers licences may not be recognised! Not difficult, but what a pain!

View from the double bed over the cab in Big Ted that we decided to try out. Jackie's mum Pauline had the bed at the back

Woodland walk past  the isolated All Saints Church 

This was followed by a panic as I opened a letter from the motorhome insurance people, who had been notified, by a third party, of an incident in Scotland, involving our wing mirror, contacting the wing mirror of an oncoming mobilehome. Having looked at our dash cam footage we had seen little point in making a claim as it was likely to be ‘tit for tat’! The other party it would appear did make a claim on their insurance, who had therefore contacted our insurance. It’s horrible how your stomach leaps into your mouth when you read a letter like that! Having had a phone call and sent in our dash cam footage we have since had an email saying it would attempt a “bear own loss settlement” so fingers crossed our file will be marked ‘for information’ and no more will come of it!

Pauline at The English Whisky Distillery at Thetford

Monday night, fabulous last curry at Diwans with 2/3 of the Monday Club.

Tuesday was sorting the van for our night away with mum, and beginning the final sort of “stuff”. Third meal in the thermal cooker and a G&T with Sarah.

Wednesday an uneventful, but slow, drive to Bury St Edmunds, except for the huge stone chip we got in the windscreen! Are we jinxed? We had a lovely day with Margaret and Ron before heading to our campsite where the very kind people we were buying the spare wheel and tyre from said they would deliver.

Interesting artwork on the whisky bottles

St Cuthberts church in Thetford, built with blocks of flint

A cozy evening and comfortable night in the van followed for all three of us which was good, so Halfords then to get the chip repaired, she seems to have done a great job, so keep everything crossed! We did manage a visit to the English Whisky company en route which was worth a couple of samples! Another slow journey back, but fortunately Brian and I can be whirling dervishes when required and potatoes were peeled, sliced and put in the oven before mother had even got the coffee made. This was for dauphinois potatoes to accompany the ‘duck in a tin’ duck confit we had brought back from France after skiing that it seemed a bit daft to take back to France!

Flat packing our ski gear into a vacuum bag (thanks Abi) to go in Big Ted

Friday and Saturday were sorting and packing, seemingly endlessly. The evenings gave some great light relief though, a Friday night curry with Helen, Ian and Corinne before staying at theirs so enabling a few beers, and Saturday the Solihull Mountaineering Club 60th Birthday annual dinner, so lots of catching up with, lots of old faces, interspersed with a little ceilidh dancing. Talking to people we were both surprised by how many comments we got about the blog, so “Hello everyone, it was lovely to see you all”. We stayed just round the corner with Jo and Mike, so after a bit more chat and a late night we got up this morning to pop in to Denise and Paul to say cheerio, before getting back to Alvechurch, crowbarring the last bits into Big Ted and taking him to the weighbridge, fortunately he was well within limits, so we haven’t had to start the unpacking I had half envisioned!

Little Ted getting glammed up ready to go into Big Ted

More photos from the SMC dinner. Here's Andy V and Andy D

Must dash as one more evening out is calling, Bill and Martina, we are on our way....

Monday morning P.S. from Brian: Not so fast! Jackie wrote while I sorted the photos, which always takes longer than expected, but I was ready to post by the time she had written this entry. However, if I'd posted we'd have been late, so I have time to add and thank Bill, Martina and their son Alan for an excellent evening. Fabulous food cooked by Martina, excellent demonstration of Alan's Stirling Engine (who remembers how that works? Have a look at this website: https://auto.howstuffworks.com/stirling-engine.htm) and Bill's very old model of a fixed steam engine (As an aside, we managed to load up Alan's Stirling Engine and, for the anoraks reading, here's the results: we measured 4v output from it's little generator and drew a current of 100mA that it just about managed to cope with. That's 0.4watt or, in other words it would move load of just over 100g (1N) through a distance of 0.4m in 1 second - not bad for a tiny model!). The conversation was non-stop and covered all topics from engineering to the evolution of the world. Alan's theory that advanced civilisations on alien planets (or even earth) are unlikely as they would be self-limiting by either wiping themselves out through climate change or wars or by external catastrophy is particularly interesting (where does that leave us Alan and how long have we got?). 4.5 hours went in a whirl and now we have the final pack, drop our car off at the storage and be ready for the off tomorrow morning. France, here we come!

Brian's old friends Richard and Sue with John in the background

Current SMC chairman Ian during his annual award speech, presenting the 'Peel of the Year' award (best or most spectacular fall whilst rock climbing). Mike collecting the award on behalf of Rob who was unable to attend (not through him being injured from his fall)

Last housesit and start of planning for our next trip

Brian in Gloucester Cathedral

Things are suddenly starting to get close, we plan to depart the UK a week on Tuesday (2nd October) and there is a dawning realisation of how much we need to get organised between now and then, as well as a lot of socialising to see friends and family before disappearing for some months (Brian plans until mid July next year, Jackie thinks May/June time, we'll see who gets their way!).

We left our last housesit in Stroud on Thursday evening after finally meeting Rachel and her mum, Sarah, on their return home from the South of France. They had a great time by the sound of it and, in the two hours we saw them we talked non stop, but Bramble cat wasn't too bothered, she stayed upstairs on the landing.

The beautiful Gloucester Cathedral

On our last full day there we spent a good chunk of the day in Gloucester which is a really good place to visit. It's an old Roman town  and, although little of it can be seen above ground the remains of a whole Roman city is just below the surface. Any time a building is demolished a team of archaeologists move in to sift through and catalogue the remains below ground. The underground site displaying Roman and Tudor building remains was sadly not open on the day we went, but we did visit the very impressive Gloucester Catherdral (http://gloucestercathedral.org.uk/) and the Heritage Centre steeple standing on the corner of Southgate and Westgate Streets.

The Heritage Centre steeple

It used to be a church but all but the steeple was demolished in the 1950's. The steeple still has its bell and, on visiting, the lady told us all about it and then said I could ring the bell if I wanted. Well, I thought it would be rude not to, so I gave several tugs on the rope and disrupted the quiet town centre!

We also visited the Beatrix Potter museum (http://www.tailor-of-gloucester.org.uk/about/), mostly devoted to the 'Taylor of Gloucester' based on the local story of a taylor who went home on a Friday night leaving a whole pile of work undone, only to go back on Monday to find the whole suit finished except for one button hole on the waistcoat to which was pinned a small note saying "No more twist" no one knew how this had happened, so Beatrix based the whole story on the mice who went in and did the work. 

The white building on the right is 23 Westgate Street and where the taylor shop mentioned by Beatrix Potter originally was

In the Beatrix Potter museum

Much later it came to light that the taylor's assistant had gone to a local event on Friday night, got hideously drunk and decided to sleep it off in the taylor's shop, which, unbeknown to the taylor, he had a key for. Too embarrassed to be seen leaving the shop on Saturday he thought he may as well finish the suit, except for the final button hole, before sneaking out on the Saturday night. Still a nice story, but not as good as the one created by Beatrix.

Gloucester docks https://www.gloucesterdocks.me.uk/

Sculptures in the Nature in Art museum (website here)

Since getting back we've had three nights staying with Jackie's mum in Alvechurch, during which we managed to get in a proper 'Friday night' - down to the local pub early evening for a bottle or two of red wine and a good chat, followed by a takeaway from the village Chinese - fabulous and just like the old days! On Saturday we managed to catch up with Brian's daughter Fiona and her man James, plus grand-daughter Becky, who all came over for lunch at Becketts Farm restaurant in Wythal (https://www.beckettsfarm.co.uk/restaurant/), followed by a trip over to the motorhome storage area to show them Big Ted (we think they liked him!).

Little Sooty cat is pleased to see us

Today (Sunday) we have arrived in Hall Green to spend three days looking after little Sooty cat, this now being the twelfth time we have housesat here. Abi has taken her mum away to Chester for her birthday so we have a few days to catch up with some friends, get a few jobs done and spend time with little, sweet Sooty.

Our diary until our intended departure on 2nd October runs like this:
Tonight: Sunday Tea Club with Manu, Crystal, Ian and Helen in the Chinese Quarter of Birmingham. After meeting at a pub in the centre for a beer, we will visit a small Chinese restaurant where Crystal takes charge and orders everything, presenting us with delicious Chinese food which we eat with Chinese tea and, in the process, have a fabulous evening

The very grand house at the Nature in Art museum

Monday: Big Ted visits the doctor to have his door seen to. The door lock won't open with the key, only the remote, so that's being seen to. Then we visit the physiotherapist to have Jackie's elbow looked at (tennis elbow we think after lots of decorating and roof building), then to Birmingham City Centre (again) to purchase some International Driving Permits (this is just insurance in case Britain leaves Europe on 29th March next year with no deal and our British driving licenses are no longer recognised by Europe).
Tuesday: Pack Big Ted for his night away in Norfolk.
Wednesday: Head off in Big Ted with Jackie's mum to visit Ron and Margaret in Bury St Edmunds, followed by a night away in a small campsite

Gloucester Cathedral cloisters (used in Harry Potter films)

Thursday: Visit Attleborough in Norfolk to pick up a spare wheel for Big Ted that we've bought through the website Gumtree. It's second hand, but was always a spare and has never been used
Friday: Start sorting out all the gear we are going to need for a winter of skiing in the Alps and summer sightseeing, climbing, walking amd via ferrata in Europe. Evening, catch up with Corinne and maybe Helen and Ian to hear about her trip to Iceland
Saturday: More gear sorting and start of Big Ted packing. Evening looks like being the Solihull Mountaineering Club Annual Dinner, if we can get tickets (we may be too late!), but we have got permission from the venue to camp overnight in their car park in Big Ted so, if we do go, it'll be an easy few meters to walk from the venue to our bed!

Tomb of Edward II in the cathedral

Sunday & Monday: Back to Jackie's mums for the final pack of Big Ted, shopping for food to take with us and dropping our car off at the storage area.
Tuesday: Drive to Dover for 9 months touring Europe!

The next blog may be hastily written in between all that.

Jackie hiding behind a whale tail sculpture at the Nature in Art museum

I really liked this sculpture, all made from parts of a car. It stands on an old engine block, its claws are old brake shoes, it's body has a clutch plate in it and there are various springs, pistons and engine plates. Junk to anyone else, art here

A last picture of fluffy Bramble cat in Slough before we left...

And a picture of sweet Sooty cat who we're looking after now