Oh my goodness! How long has it been? Too long I reckon, how are you doing?
I have to say, it’s an unbelievably fine feeling to be away in Vince for a long weekend. It’s like coming home; waking up in a teeny-tiny bed, sticking the kettle on, and with a fresh view out of the windows. Okay so the view is of a lot of boring caravans but at least there’s no lawn to cut or washing to do (yet).
We’ve had so much going on – more of which later – that when we saw a good forecast for the weekend we decided what the heck, and booked a three-nights-for-the-price-of-two pitch in Bridgnorth at Stanmore Hall. As you know we wandered all over five countries last summer so we’re used to long journeys. Bridgnorth is, let me see…. thirty minutes from home! It was more about the price than the location. Having said that, although we’ve been living in the area for twenty plus years, we’ve never taken the time to wander around this lovely market town.
Bisected by the winding River Severn, Bridgnorth has a High Town and a Low Town. You can walk the long way round from one to the other but fat middle-aged blokes like me tend to take the cliff railway; a short but incredibly steep climb in a Victorian carriage which creaks its way up and down all day for the princely sum of £1.60 return. Well worth it in my case for the reduced risk of heart attack.
We had a wander round the ruined castle and a nosey through the windows of the beautiful houses (incuding Thomas Telford’s former residence) before braving the high street. On Saturday mornings the market there is in full swing with antiques stalls, butchers and bakers but sadly no candle-stick makers. Our only purchase was an oven lighter for our candles & the barbie. I’d tried searching for ‘oven lighter’ on eBay but all I got was 1,472 matches. (Sorry.) The black and white timber built Town Hall dominates the street, built originally in 1652 it has an open-air market area beneath. I suspect the farmers and merchants of the seventeenth century would look rather askance at some of the tat being peddled in their market hall now…
As I write we’re on our second morning here. The site is about three miles from the historic town centre, but seeing as we didn’t suffer too many ill-effects from walking there and back yesterday we thought we’d try a country stroll today in the opposite direction. Once we’ve made the most of the facilities here – they have amazing power showers with gallons of scalding hot water – we’ll wander over to the country park which surrounds Stanmore Hall. The grounds there used to be an RAF training camp but have been planted with hundreds of trees and allowed to return to nature. All that remains of the buildings is the cookhouse chimney which has been turned into a memorial to the men who trained there and who gave their lives in conflict. Unbelievably I shall have to slather on the sun-block as I managed to acquire a beacon-like red face yesterday without realising until it was too late, dammit.
So what’s new since last we spoke? We’ve hinted a few times at how much we’d like to travel more with the big fella – we had such a good time in Europe last summer, and bloomin’ Facebook keeps reminding us what we were doing twelve months ago. (We were 15 days away from departure this time last year so it’s only going to get worse). We’ve looked at so many options over the months including renting out our house but we’re more comfortable with the idea of having a base which we can return to at short notice if necessary.
Our plan starts with the sale of our house, which goes on the market this week, eek! Now our family has shrunk with the departure of our daughters it makes financial sense to downsize. We have nowhere to go yet, but we spent a week in South-West Scotland earlier in the month and loved the area, especially the coast, so that’s where we’ll make our new home in the longer term. We looked at a few houses without finding the special one which felt just right but we’ll keep looking. If our place sells quickly we’ll just whack everything into storage and go travelling in Vince until we spot something online! We’re lucky enough to have family in our chosen area who have kindly offered to view anything interesting if we’re too far away.
It’s scary not knowing what even the short-term future holds, but kind of exciting too. There’s no question of sinking into a lazy retirement for us, not while there’s fuel in Vince’s tank, bacon and beer in the fridge and a whole continent to explore…
We’ll keep you posted 🙂
And the adventure begins…..
You know our feelings on the subject make sure there’s a campsite near to where you settle and we will have a good excuse to call and see you xx
Aww thank you 🙂 You don’t need an excuse to visit – we’ll trade you for the use of your drive as a stop-off on the way to Dover! xxx