It's a Blog ! Not a Log !

Well our holiday in Dorset and Cornwall is well and truely over now, been back in Manchester about 3 weeks and I’m only just getting round to posting some of the videos I created with the GoPro and the Camalapse.

First one up is a visit to Lulworth Cove, not my best effort, but its ok for my first attempt

Next up is one of Mullion Cove, the place we stay every year we go to Cornwall, think this is about our 5th year there now and we never grow tired of the view

Final video is from our visit to The Lizard, what spectacular views you get there, it’s quite a thought provoking place to visit

All the video’s were created using either a GoPro HD Hero 2 or with a JVC Camcorder, timelapse setting were between 0.5 seconds and 1 second, the panning timelapse was created using a Camalapse.

I’m hoping to do a few more in the future, thinking maybe of doing a couple in the centre of Manchester in the summer maybe.

Hope you’ve enjoyed the video’s

Only 10 days left till we go on this years holidays to Dorset and Cornwall. . .

This is the time of the year that I really look forward to, just me, Mel and Blue on our ownsomes in a little cottage on the coast, first up Lulworth Cove and then a week at Mullion Cove.

This year I’m intending on avoiding alot of driving and just spending the 2 weeks relaxing for a change, we’ve been to Cornwall so many times now that we must have visited just about every tourist type town on the map, just going to stick to our favourites this year me thinks.

So expect some posts from our hols to follow shortly

that British Gas are doing work on our road and needed access to the house while we were away to change our gas meter, so where now without gas until Monday/Tuesday, so gonna be a cold couple of days

Anyway heres some photos and videos from our hols

Heres the photos and link

Now here a few time lapse car journeys we did:

Little East Underdown Cottages to Lynmouth – Time-lapse Car

Lynmouth to Barnstaple – Time-lapse journey

Time-lapse car journey from Exmouth to the cottage we are staying at Little East

Cockington to Little East Underdown

Anyway hope you enjoy . .

After a six hour drive we’ve arrived at this years Autumn holiday destination, a lovely set of cottages at Little East Underdown in Devon.

The cottage were staying at is part of a barn conversion, it’s situated within Dartmoor National Park, so I’m expecting to at least get some good walking in at some point over the week.

First thing to be done when we arrived was to try out the amenities, which just happen to include a swimming pool & a sauna, it definitely helped relax me after the drive, think I’m going o be using those every morning while were here.

Not to sure were to go tomorrow yet, think we’ll check the net out and see if there’s any car boots on nearby, as for now I have a rather sad faced dog called Blue looking at me wondering when I’m going to take her for a walk.

till my holidays in april . .  thanks to Will’s and Kate I’m having an extended break away from work and only using about 6 days holidays to have 2 weeks away from work, which is pretty neat them getting married around a normal Bank Holiday, thus giving us an extra day off, thank to both of you

So where are we heading your asking . .  Well our first week shall be spent in St Leonards on Sea nr Hastings Sussex and the following week will be spent in the lovely Wales nr Snowdonia, somewhere I’ve wanted to go to for quite a while, lots of nice green countryside and local pubs for me, Mel and Blue to enjoy

Will make sure I take lots of lovely pictures to share with you all.

In other news we had a Manager leave work a couple of weeks ago headed for better and brighter things, gonna miss Andy, he was a pretty decent guy, someone you could chat to not just as a Manager, but also as a friend, he’s helped me god knows how many times when I’ve had dilema’s at work that I needed to talk through, such a shame he was put in a situation where he had to leave or be unhappy, also had someone from Purchasing leave after only being there for less than 6 months, but he to seems to have had enough of the workplace also, maybe one day I might have the balls myself to go looking for somewhere else to work, but it’s hard getting the nerve and will power to look for other jobs when your morals at such a low ebb.
So for now I’ll just have to bite the bullet and press on and see what the year brings . . .

Well it’s been nearly 2 months since Blue went in for her cruciate ligament surgery, the first 4 weeks were the hardest time for both her and us.

For the first 3 weeks I spent most nights sleeping on the sofa in the front room to keep her company and to ensure she didn’t try climbing onto any of the furniture, I can honestly say they were the most painful 3 weeks I’ve ever spent, my back was killing me by the end of it all, but it seemed to do the trick, as Blues recovery since then has moved on leaps & bounds.

By the time we went on holiday Blue wad managing about 10-15 minute walks with no I’ll effects, which meant we could actually go visiting places while we were in Dorset, we’d been worried that we would end up spending the whole week sat in the cottage we’d rented.
Over the week we managed to visit Salisbury, where we spent a pleasant day walking round the Cathedral grounds & checking out the shops that made up this historic town, we also got to visit Swannage, Bournemouth, Lyme Regis, Dorchester & even got as far as Sidmouth, still never managed Monkey World though, we didn’t think dogs would have been allowed in, shame really as this is somewhere I would like to visit one day.

Anyway Blue came on leaps & bounds while we were away and managed all the walking that visiting these Dorset entailed, after we got back we’ve been carrying on with Blue exercise regime & are still building up her muscles slowly but surely, it’s hard to think that 10 weeks ago she couldn’t walk without limping, and just a short 8 weeks ago she couldn’t put any weight on her leg at all due to the surgery, now when you see her walking you wouldn’t think she’d had anything wrong with her.

The cost so far for all her surgery and aftercare has been about £3500, she’s still got to have at least 2 more visits to the surgery for x-rays etc, so I imagine by then the bill will be nearer £4000, hey but at least we were insured so have only ended up paying about £2500 for the op so far, but I don’t care how much it would of cost, I’d have found some way of paying it, after all she is our little Princess.

Only a couple more hours left of our holiday in Whitby, wishing we were here for another week to be honest, its been a good time at Squirrel Acres Cottage, had enjoyable evenings just sat on the sun terrace/veranda listening to the sounds of the wood and its many inhabitants, I’ve even shared my breakfast with a few of them.

I think I can say me, Mel and Blue have enjoyed the cottage more than the days out, its been so relaxing here, definatly helped recharge our batteries and destress from work, I’ll take home some nice memories, even the ones that involve being awoken every morning by the dawn chorus at 4:30-5:30am.

We spent our last full day here exploring the coast to the North of Whitby and found a very dog friendly beach at Sandsend and an even dog friendly pub the Hart Inn, which by the way serves the nicest piece of Gammon I’ve had the pleasure to consume in a very very long time, well presented as well.

After Sandsend we spent the last few hours of yesterday wondering round the shops of Whitby once more to see if we could pick up any last minute bargains, which I’m happy to say I did, and once again they were all from the local charity shops, I managed to get hold of a few graphic novels, some DVD’s and a couple more computer games, all of which were priced between £1.99 to £2.50.  In total I’ve come back from my hols with 3 graphic novels, 2 DVD’s and 6 computer games and I’ve spent a sum total of about £12, whicch aint bad considering most of these games were originally £20 odd pounds each, and they are’nt even that old, maybe a year and half at the most.

Think my mum has the right idea about charity shop bargains and I will now be sure to check them out more often

Anyway where do we go from here, well were heading to my mums in Market Weighton for Sunday’s Giant Bradley day celebrations, where we’ll be entering Blue in the Fun Dog Show and hoping that she gets another top 3 place like she has for the past 2 years, then on Sunday night we’ll probably head back across to Manchester for one last day of chilling and then alas on Tuesday its back to work, but less thinking of that and more thinking about booking this place again next summerb

P1060571, originally uploaded by BagRat.

Well were now into the 4th day of our holiday and we’ve managed to cram in visits to :

Whitby Abbey, which was a pleasant couple of hours spent walking round the remains of what at one time must have been a very imposing structure (still is I suppose) for such a small coastal town of the times, the views from the hill its built on give you some very good panoramic views over Whitby and the surrounding area.

Filey which once you’ve seen it you’ve seen it

Goathland, again a pleasant little village which seems to be making a living off the back of Heartbeat, just about every shop there is a gift shop, which is a shame, as I’m sure it would be nicer/quainter if it actually had some proper shops.

Becks Hole, home of what must be Britains smallest Pub, The Birch Hall Inn, nice place to stop off in for a beer and one of their hearty sandwichs and home made Pork Pies, dogs are welcome as well.

Grosmont, the place where the steam engine line starts and home of the steam engine workshops, you can go for a ride on one of the locally restored Steam Engines and experience a time gone by, theres also a nice little pub there just by the railway crossings that serves a very nice Beer battered Cod and Chips.

Pickering, which is a quaint little Market Town and also the end of the line for Grosmonts Steam Railway, theres a rather nice little bakery there that does lots of home made sweet and savoury pies.
The day we went there was a flea market on which had quite a few nice antique stalls for those who like that sort of thing, you’ve also got the remains of Pickering Castle, which sadly we did’nt get to explore as it not open on a Monday or Tuesday.

Probably going to have a drive to Scarborough today as it looks like its gonna be a sunny day indeed . .

P1060619, originally uploaded by BagRat.

One of the real nice things about the cottage we are staying at in Ruswarp is the birdfeeder attached to the Sun Terrace outside our veranda doors, every morning we’ve been here we’ve sat outside to have breakfast and without fail every morning we’ve been joined for breakfast by various woodland birds, along with the odd squirrel or two.

Its so quiet and peaceful here, a really great place to recharge our batteries, Blue likes it to as theres a nice little woodland path nearby which we explore every morning with her.

While we’ve been here we’ve managed to visit Goathland, home of the 60′s themed Heartbeat TV show, Filey and Whitby itself, where we wondered up to the old Abbey above the town, you find photos of our journeys on my flickr page, the link to which is listed on this blog.

Today where heading to a place called the Birch Hall Inn, a little pub that a twitter friend @shiveringgoat recommended to us, looks a rather quaint place and is apparently very dog friendly, will report back later on how it held up to his recommendations.

in about 5hrs we’ll be in Dorset