Room with a View

Following the visit of Her Majesty the Queen in July, my wife and I have just enjoyed a special one night break at the Miller Howe Hotel millerhowe.com ,a small Arts and Crafts hotel, set in 5 acres of grounds, overlooking Windermere in Cumbria.

The Miller Howe Hotel

Arranged by our daughters and their husbands, as a gift to celebrate my 70th birthday, they knew that we would truly appreciate the special quality of this long established restaurant and hotel. It was set up in 1971 by John Tovey, the renowned chef, hotelier and food writer who is now in his eighties.

Possibly one of the first Country House Hotels, it has always enjoyed a first class reputation for food, comfort and service. The Head chef is Andy Beaton who worked for Raymond Blanc in his restaurant,'Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons.

From our bedroom window, with the Langdale Pikes in the distance

The weather when we set off from home was not really condusive to carefree Morgan driving, so we got our trusty 11 year old Volvo V70 out of the garage, a luxury car to match our accommodation!

...and another, I couldn't stop taking shots of this view!

The hotel lived up to its reputation, with a lovely quiet ambience, magnificent food and superbly efficient and friendly service......and we awoke in the morning to that glorious view.

The Blind Piper!

At last, the website of the 'Blind Piper Pub' in Caherdaniel is up and running www.blindpiperpub.com and our Morgan appears in the banner, 12 images in.

My wife and I are delighted, as we have so many happy memories of our holiday in Kerry with the Morgan and it was fortuitous that, on one of our visits to this delightful tavern, we parked outside and Vincent Hyland just happened to be taking shots of the pub for the new website.

The Blind Piper pub

Vincent is a local artist and naturalist, as well as a lovely chap, and I suggest that you have a look at the following websites  www.ayearinkerry.com and www.vincenthylandartist.com  which I think will truly give you a sense of the magic that is the wild coast of Kerry and encourage you to visit.

No caption necessary really!

The full story of our visit to this fabulous area can be read in my blog '4/4 to Kerry'.

Start 'em young!

At last I was able to keep my promise to my eldest grandson....a drive in Grandad's Morgan.

He never stopped talking on our drive and after giving me initial instructions not to drive fast, decided, after 200 yards, that he rather enjoyed travelling fast.

All smiles!

During the whole trip I never exceeded the speed limits, but with the sidescreens off it seems like you are travelling extremely fast, especially to a 4 year old!.....and perhaps to a 70 year old as well!

We both thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

'Oh, I do like to be beside the seaside!'.........

........especially on days like this.

The sun has been shining all day, a wonderful change from the rather gloomy and wet weather we have had recently and this prompted us to make the most of it by going for a drive in our freshly polished steed.

Wrea Green, with 'The Grapes' and church in the background.

First stop was a splendid tavern, 'The Grapes', between Kirkham and Lytham St Annes in Lancashire, where we quaffed some splendid real ale sitting outside in the sun. Whilst there, my wife pointed out that we hadn't driven the Mog along the promenade at Blackpool and that sounded like an excellent idea.

Lytham St Annes

After a brief stop at the RNLI shop in Lytham we travelled along the coast, enjoying a measure of sophistication, until the Blackpool boundary was passed and we entered a different world, a brash, gaudy, noisy place, built solely for fun.... not the sort of fun we enjoy, but many people do.

The 'Big One'

In its shadow.

There is no place like it and it is still the most visited resort in Britain, if not Europe. Gone are the times when thousands of people shuffled down the promenade passed my father's fancy goods shop in the 'Palace Varieties' buildings (long gone) and were crammed deckchair to deckchair on the beaches.

'Cinderella' presumably!

However,  Blackpool still draws the crowds even now, mainly for day trips or short breaks, but those glory days, when people from industrial Lancashire, Yorkshire and elsewhere used to spend their summer holidays here, before cheap holidays on the Costas became the vogue, are a part of history.

Sadly, the Tower is having some sort of paint job, that seems to be taking an inordinately long time to complete and is partially shrouded in polythene, so it's more graceful lines have been somewhat lost.

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Musing about the future

Unlike my dear Morgan friend in Sweden, I am not forced by weather conditions to lay-up the car in Winter, which he is doing at the present time. Fortunately it is usually possible to enjoy a few drives during the dark months, when conditions allow.

However, I do like to keep the Morgan in first class shape and especially at this time of year and feel it  desirable that the body should have a good waxing, the hood a good clean and of course all the brightwork cleaned and polished.

Gleaming again!

It was while completing this task, in a garage well protected from the howling wind outside, that I pondered the decision by the Board of the Morgan Company to oust Charles Morgan.

In the light of this important development and in the absence of any announcement from the Board about the future direction of the Company, there is bound to be a high level of speculation.

On reading the news in the Daily Telegraph Business Section and the comments of his wife concerning 'greed' amongst other members of the family and the Board, it suggests to me that these people might have ill-founded grandiose ideas about the Company's future.

As I said to another Morgan chum, if they are keen to move away from the enviable niche position that Morgan enjoys in the marketplace and have hopes of lining their pockets by going into the mainstream, they would, in my opinion, be extremely misguided

It is the eccentricity of this hand-built marque, even at the most expensive model level, that is it's attraction and from where it's success stems.

The Board needs to be very sensitive to the key and unusual attractions of the product before allowing their imaginations to run away with them.

I do hope that they have the nous not to kill the goose that has laid the golden egg!

Cruising down the River

In 1954, when I was a young chap of 11, I made my first visit with my family to the Norfolk Broads and that holiday sowed the seeds for a deep and lasting affection for that area.

With its huge skies, boundless wildlife and slow moving rivers and broads, fringed by whispering reed beds, it has a unique appeal and linked with my enduring love of boats, has constantly drawn me back. Indeed my wife and I spent our honeymoon there in 1966, on a fine vessel called 'Star Glory' from the yard of Jack Powles in Wroxham and when our own family was young we spent happy times just messing about in boats.

Sunset, Oulton Dyke

So it was that I responded to that deep seated urge to return yet again and booked a four day short break on 'Silver Mirage' from Silverline Marine "http//:www.silverlinemarine.co.uk", on the River Yare at Brundall near Norwich. My crew were my illustrious wife and her sister, who I hoped had not forgotten how to tie a clove-hitch since our last visit, or lost the ability to leap into the unknown as the Commander made his attempts to bring our vessel within jumping distance of the mooring. On both counts my expectations were ill-founded!

Moored stern-on in Beccles Yacht Station

It's quite a long slog across country from Lancashire so we decided to spend a night in Thetford, to break the journey, in one of those 'purple' hotels that in a previous post I was quite critical of.

Whether or not their training team had taken to heart my criticism on 'Trip Adviser' following that earlier visit I don't know, but not once did I hear 'Hi-ya y'alright there!' and neither were we referred to as 'guys' preceded by the aforementioned phrase, in the restaurant! In fact any greeting was a civilised hello or good morning which pleased this miserable old git immensely.

Early morning Worlingham Staithe

The approach to the boatyard is always exciting. Would our chosen vessel be as gorgeous as we expected or would it have been holed by the bowsprit of a passing yacht or perhaps had its canopy swept aside under a low bridge by an incompetent skipper who was unable to understand the tide tables?

We need not have worried, there she lay at her mooring, resplendent in the sunshine awaiting our arrival. The owner of the yard greeted us and having sorted out the paperwork, the business of unloading our provisions from the Volvo and into the boat proceeded apace.

On the River Waveney en route for Loddon

Why is it that we always take with us three times the amount of clothing that we are likely to need and our food and drink supplies would have been more appropriate to the needs of the 'Queen Mary 2'!  Honestly, anyone would have thought that we were setting off on a voyage around Cape Horn and beyond!

Anyway, following an in-depth conversation with the boatyard owner about the benefits of owning a Morgan  as he was thinking of buying one,(he had spotted my MSCC sticker on the car), we set off into the wide blue yonder

Herringfleet Drainage Mill

As we only had 4 days it had been decided to concentrate on the southern rivers of the system, the Yare, the Waveney and the Chet and our first overnight mooring was in Oulton Dyke which leads into Oulton Broad, the very place where, as a boy, all those years ago, I had gazed at that lovely cruiser with its varnished mahogany gleaming in the sunshine that was to be our holiday home for a week.Incidentally it was hired from a certain Jim Hoseason who was just setting up, what is now a huge holiday organisation from his small boatyard at Oulton.

The next day we had a leisurely cruise up the River Waveney to Beccles where this ageing 'plonker' made two very embarrassing blunders!

Moored at Loddon

En route to Beccles we stopped to fill up with water and found that I couldn't engage the bow thrusters, a very useful modern addition to cruisers that greatly assist in the whole mooring process. The boatyard was duly phoned and the engineer said that he would meet us in Beccles to effect a repair.

Calm evening at Loddon

We moored stern on in the Yacht Station and the young lady Harbour Master advised that I should lower the mudweight (a large heavy lump of metal) from the bow to stop any swinging from side to side.This was done and we waited for the engineer, who arrived as arranged, promptly went to the thruster control, pressed them and found that there was not a thing wrong with them....it was the Commander's ineptitude or downright stupidity to blame. Thoroughly embarrassing.

After waving the engineer goodbye, accompanied by many apologies, we walked into the town to top up provisions, buy postcards (my wife and sister love to send postcards) and have lunch and a beer.

Loddon Staithe

On our return to the boat the engine was started, the two stern mooring lines stowed and we set off assisted by fully functioning bow thrusters. We had travelled barely 20 yards when we heard a strangled cry from a lady in a cruiser moored close by, kindly informing us that our mudweight was still down!

This was a situation that demanded the swiftest action to prevent anyone else seeing our plight and compounding our embarrassment. The Commander brought the vessel to a halt, handed the helm to his wife and leapt forward to the bow and hauled the weight on to the deck where he virtually collapsed, having forgotten that he is no longer the sprightly and strong person of his youth!

Rockland St Mary Staithe

We moored for the night at a village staithe where we were joined by a group of fishermen who positioned themselves off our bow and talked and fished until 3.30AM when they finally left us in peace....an interesting day!

Magical last morning, Rockland Broad

Fortuately the rest of the holiday was less eventful and we spent a beautiful evening in Loddon on the River Chet and our final night was spent moored on the village staithe at Rockland St Mary, where fortuitously there is a fine tavern, The New Inn, recently taken over and refurbished, where we enjoyed a very pleasant evening meal.

Just wonderful!

Dawn on our last day was sensational, it was calm, the sun shining through a low mist that hung over the river and Rockland Broad as we made our way to the boatyard, always a sad moment and four days is just not enough....I envied the couple moored alongside us at Rockland St Mary who had just enjoyed two weeks in this delightful part of the country.

Journeys end, Brundall on the River Yare

A pootle in the Dales.

Assured by the Meteorological Office that we were to enjoy the last gloriously sunny day, before a change in the weather would herald the approach of Autumn, we decided to venture into the Yorkshire Dales.

Following our usual route via Hornby in the Lune Valley, Thornton-in-Lonsdale and Ingleton we travelled to Hawes, passed the Ribblesdale Viaduct that carries the Settle/Carlisle railway line and savouring the fabulous moorland scenery with the flat-topped Ingleborough mountain always present.

Above Hawes at the start of the 'Buttertubs Pass'

From Hawes we drove over the Buttertubs Pass and into Swaledale, where we intended to have a look at the little village of Muker. Little did we know that our visit just happened to coincide with the Muker Agricultural Show, always held on the first Wednesday in September.

Apparently it is a delightful, friendly, traditional Show and certainly very popular, as the place was absolutely heaving with humanity. The beauty of the village was somewhat blighted by this onslaught and so, being slightly averse to large crowds and vast numbers of cars, we beat a hasty retreat. Miserable 'b....rs' I hear you say!

Wain Wath Force

We had a picnic to enjoy, not the usual one that borders on a gastronomic extravaganza, but a single delicious, mouth-watering pork pie, purchased from one of our friendly local suppliers.

The spot we chose to consume this succulent item was Wain Wath Force, a beautiful waterfall just upstream of Keld, where the River Swale is in its infancy.

On then, travelling north along Birkdale, to Nateby and Kirby Stephen, on the upper reaches of the River Eden before turning west to Sedbergh, Kirby Lonsdale and home, stopping for that welcome pint enroute at the 'Fat Lamb' public house at Ravenstonedale "www.http://fatlamb.co.uk".

Outside the 'Fat Lamb'

Interestingly the 'Black Sheep Ale' which I was drinking with some relief and pleasure was brewed by Paul Theakston, who named the ale after leaving the family brewing firm of 'Theakstons' to set up his own operation in Masham, hence the name 'Black Sheep'!

Apparently, the landlord at the 'Fat Lamb' has a keen interest in classic cars but sadly he wasn't there, so the inevitable discussion between the two of us was missed. There's always next time!