Heading South.....

We are now heading south...
This morning we left the Wodhall Spa C&CC site and this afternoon we pulled into the St Neots C&CC site....

Our first impression of the site is very favourable with lush grass kept to a very high standard and a river running along one side of the campsite..... Two of the assistants working here we first met last year when we stayed at the Verwood location..
We will only be staying here for two nights as for us our visit is purely as a transit site. Mind you we have already managed a walk along the riverside path and a visit to a very nice pub for a drink and a meal......

Before we left Woodhall Spa we visited Tattershall Castle... 
This is a superb 15th century red brick castle... It is one of the earliest and finest surviving examples of English medieval brickwork. 

Anne and I went up through each of the floors and found our visit really interesting although Anne wouldn't go up to the upper roof area as heights are not really her thing.....
Having said that I have to be honest and admit that the older I get I don't have the same confidence with heights as I used to have when I was younger.... The upper roof area of the castle made me feel very uncomfortable....

Tattershall Castle

While we were staying at Woodhall Spa we were entertained each day by the ducks that were resident at the site.... Their home was centered around a small pond in the wooded area of the camp.... 
However each day they would go on walkabout around the caravans and tents hoping to get some food.....
Duck food was available to buy at the camp reception/shop and Anne loved feeding the little blighters as they came round and visited our caravan..... 
By the end of our stay which was around four weeks they would sit outside our van in the morning waiting for Anne to feed them...
The photo below shows them waiting outside our awning one morning a few days ago.......

Anne's little duck friends waiting for more food......

A visit to Lincoln.....

One of the places that was on our list to visit was of course Lincoln....
We used the park and ride which seemed to be pretty efficient and saved any hassles with finding a suitable parking place in the city itself....
Judging by the number of people waiting at the park and ride bus stop it seems to be a popular way to travel into the centre of the city.....

We alighted from the bus at the bus station at the bottom of the hill.... there is a new shopping precinct close by and our plan was to look around the shops there before walking along the main high street and then heading up 'Steep Hill' (which as the name suggests IS steep) up to the castle and the cathedral at the top of the hill.
From there we would then catch the park and ride bus back to the car....

The plan worked well allowing us to see a good number of Lincolns attractions as we made our way through the city..... The weather was good which is always a bonus if you are having a 'tourist' type of day.....

One of the many interesting buidings to be seen

There were lots of very interesting buildings to be seen and the history of the city was to be seen everywhere.....

Lincoln Stonebow and Guildhall

Halfway up the high street is the Stonebow and Guildhall.
The name 'Stonebow' is of Scandinavian origin meaning a stone arch. The east wing of the Stonebow used to house the city gaol but these days it houses the Guildhall Treasury...
The present Tudor Arch was completed by city freemason William Spencer in 1520

Steep hill...and it is!!

As you carry on up the high street you eventually arrive at Steep Hill..... The gradient appears to be similar to Gold Hill at Shaftesbury in Dorset.
There are lots of vintage, antique and retro stores on Steep Hill as well as tea shops, pubs and restaurants. 
Anne and I rewarded our ascent of Steep Hill with a meal and a drink at one of the pubs we found near the top of the hill...  

View towards the Cathedral at the top of Steep Hill

Upon arrival at the top of the hill to our right was the view towards the Cathedral.........

View of the Castle entrance....

and to our left was the castle entrance as shown in the above photograph.....

West Front of Lincoln Cathedral

Anne and I were really impressed with Lincoln Cathedral. We found that the Cathedral's West front to be absolutely stunning and it appeared to be massive dwarfing everything around. 

John Ruskin the eminent Victorian writer wrote "I have always held.... that the cathedral of Lincoln is out and out the most precious piece of architecture in the British Isles and roughly speaking worth any two other cathedrals we have."

No description I can write could describe Lincoln cathedral better than that....so I won't try..!

Interior view of Lincoln cathedral....

Anne and I really enjoyed our visit to Lincoln and were most impressed with the magnificent historic buildings.
If you have never visited the city and enjoy a bit of history then I can recommend that you visit Lincoln.....

Finally...A New Post...

Finally a new post...
It's been over two weeks since I last posted an entry here on the blog.....but I do have a good reason.... Anne and I were hit with some kind of bug that knocked us both for six a few days before we left Sandringham.... 
Even now we still both have a bit of a cough.

To complicate our move up here to Woodhall Spa.... on the day we were due to move the car wouldn't start...the battery appeared to be flat. The car hadn't been used for nearly three weeks.. RAC were called but took over four hours to arrive... Battery was checked and although flat was perfectly serviceable so we can only assume something had been left on and drained the said battery... 

Due to this we stayed an extra night at Sandringham and arrived at Woodhall Spa a day late but it was a bit of hassle that we could both have done without feeling so rough....
The first couple of days at our current site were spent in bed trying to throw off the bug....
Mind you it did give me the chance to change the cleats on my cycling shoes for brand new ones... The old cleats were really well over due for changing...

Well worn cleat...Overdue for changing

Brand shiny new cleats fitted

 On my first venture out from the campsite to top up on our supplies what should I see but a nice old petrol pump..... Regular readers to the blog will be only well aware of my interest in these and I always like to post images of these pumps whenever I see them. This one seems to date from the seventies.....

Nice old petrol pump.... possibly from the seventies?

 For the first week and a half of being here at Woodhall Spa we did very little as we both felt so low.... But this past weekend my good friend Peter Calcutt visited us for two nights as a bit of a break during another stage of his British Coastline cycle ride.... For the past couple of years Peter has used part of his holiday to cycle a section. 

The first year he cycled from Bournemouth to Deal in Kent.... Last year he cycled from Deal to Holbeach near the Wash...... This year he started at Holbeach and will be cycling to...... well that's to be seen.

I rode out to meet him and lead him into our campsite on his arrival day and on Monday morning when he set off again I rode out with him for a couple of hours before he headed on North and I turned round and headed back here to the site.....

Peter sorting out his kit during his stay with us.

 While he was here Peter and I went on a bit of a nature trek in the local woods... There is a hide there that was installed back in 1983 and we both spent some time there keeping an eye out for some wildlife.... As it transpired apart from some swallows we didn't really spot anything worth reporting.... mind you bird and wildlife spotting does require a lot of time and patience.....
There is another hide at some other woods at the end of the lane and a couple told us today that they have spotted a couple of Kingfishers there so Anne and I might well spend some time in that hide to see if we can spot them too.....

The small hide in the woods...

Royal House and Gardens....

Well we couldn't pitch-up at our campsite on the Sandringham Estate without a visit to the house and gardens....

We had originally planned to visit the gardens during the Sandringham flower show last Wednesday but the weather proved to be pretty inclement and we did not fancy trudging around the show in the wet.... Even the attendance of Prince Charles and Camilla couldn't drag us up there in the wet weather.......

Thursday proved to be a much better day so a decision was made and we wandered up to the house and gardens on that day for our visit....

We enjoyed our visit and the museum in the old stable block was very interesting with a number of cars on display that had been used by various members of the Royal Family over the years....

We also visited the church just outside the main gardens where the Queen and other members of the Royal Family attend the service on Christmas morning......

I've posted below just a few of the images I took during our visit.....

Sandringham House

Gilded Bronze Statue of the Buddhist Divinity Kuvera

Close-up Image of Kuvera

Gravestones of Royal Corgis

View of the House from the Gardens

Interior View of the Church

A Royal Location.....

We have enjoyed some mixed weather over the past week since we have been here at our site on the Sandringham Estate......
Sandringham House is within walking distance of our location being just a mile up the road...
We have walked up to the visitors centre but have not made a proper visit yet.....
There will be a flower show in the grounds of the house on Wednesday this coming week and we are planning to visit the grounds and the church then.....

'The Norfolk Gates' of Sandringham House

We have a nice pitch at the C&CC site situated in amongst the trees..... The site itself is pretty big having over 270 pitches and ten members of staff to run it... It is the largest site that we have stayed on since we started fulltiming nearly two and a half years ago.... 

Our pitch at the Sandringham C&CC site....(Note: Still flying the Devon Flag)

The cycling in the area continues to be good.... Lots of B-roads with very light motorised traffic... The more I have cycled in Suffolk and Norfolk the more I see what a great area it is for cycle touring. I was so lucky to have cycled in these counties all those years ago when the roads were even quieter than they are now.
Since we have been here I have cycled up to the North Norfolk coast a few times and enjoyed each ride...... 

Village sign on one of my rides..

A view along the Groynes at Hunstanton

 We have also visited Hunstanton a traditional small seaside town which I have always thought of as the Swanage of the East Coast.... 
The last time I visited the town was on Boxing Day about forty years ago when I visited a friend who had moved there.... The town certainly seems to have grown a bit since that last visit and doesn't seem as desolate a place as it seemed to be on that day.. Mind you the picture that I have shown here doesn't show the best view of the town so don't judge it by that photograph.

Two things of interest about Hunstanton are:-
1) It's the only East Coast seaside resort where you can watch the sun set directly over the sea .
2) It's also the home to Britains largest joke shop which is packed to the rafters with things like itching powder and whoopie cushions.....

Castle Rising.... The Castle Keep showing just above the mounds of the dry moat.

 A couple of days ago we completed the five mile return walk to Castle Rising another place that I haven't visited for forty plus years....
The main attraction at Castle Rising other than the very nice tea rooms is of course the castle...

It is a 12th century castle that became the home of Queen Isabella, mother of Edward 111, following her part in the brutal murder of her husband, Edward 11 in 1327.
The current owner is a descendant of William D'Albini 11 the Norman Baron who raised the castle.....

Interior view at Castle Rising Keep.

Another interior view of the Castle Keep

 After visiting the Castle a visit to the superb tea rooms was in order for a spot of lunch and as we were leaving the tea rooms we noticed a telephone box on the corner of the road...
We took a double take .... the telephone box was full of books with a notice stating that this was the Castle Rising village library.....
Whether this was the result of financial cuts and needing to move to smaller premises I don't know...but pretty unusual just the same....Dare I say 'a pretty novel idea'

Telephone Box - Home to Castle Rising Village Library

-

More images of Norwich...

With the TDF still running and our move on to the next site on our list timed with the TDF rest day I am not going to write too much in this post....however I will post some additional images taken during our stay in Norwich.......

Norwich Castle

Norwich Cathedral

The cobbles of Elm Hill

The coloured canopies of Norwich Market

The Guildhall

We nearly didn't come here as there were a lot of poor comments on the internet regarding the site.... 

The toilet facilities are dated...straight out of the 1950s in fact and the club really should invest some of our membership fees into a new facilities block...however everything is kept clean and tidy by the Managers and Assistants who are a friendly and helpful bunch and the position of the site has proved just perfect for us..... the comments proved far worse than the reality and we have enjoyed our stay here.....

On Monday we move on to Sandringham......

Lots to Do....

Well our stop here in Norwich is one of those places where the two weeks that we booked is proving not to be long enough as we are finding lots to do....

Starting with the important thing..... my daily ride on the bike.
I have managed to sort out a really good loop to ride out into the Norfolk countryside...
As with Suffolk I am finding some really quiet lanes and roads to enjoy....although the roads here in East Anglia are not as flat as a lot of people think they are I do miss the really stiff hills that you can find back in Devon and Dorset....

Below is a picture of my bike at Starston Church which is a village about fifteen miles south of Norwich on my daily ride.....

Starston Church about fifteen miles south of Norwich...

 Walking is good here direct from the campsite.....
There are some good walks along the river Wensum which loops around the city...

The River Wensum and part of the old city wall

 As an alternative you can head out of the city...... You can walk out to the village of Trowse where there is a very nice pub where you can enjoy a pint in a very pretty beer garden just full of flowers.....

Trowse village sign

 Apparently the pubs beer garden was a regional winner last year in a pub garden competition....

I think this was my second pint......

 I have also managed to visit some places from the past as well......
The image below is of the alleyway running between the rear gardens of the houses in the street (Marlborough Road) where my Maternal Grandparents used to live.

When I was a small child we would sometimes come to Norwich to visit my Grandparents and I can remember playing in this alleyway.....
It actually seems to be a lot more neat and tidy than I remember it when I was a kid....

The Alleyway at the back of Marlborough Road......

As I said we have found lots to do and on top of that there has been the Tour de France to watch on the TV as well....

This retirement business can be hard work......