Vanlife – Page 3 – turnrightoutofportsmouth

A visit to Carcassone on the way to Narbonne

Looking for a site around Carcassone we were struggling to find somewhere that was still open at this time of year. So we decided to just visit on the way to the coast – we’d found a site at Narbonne that was open, les Floralys.

What we neglected to do was to decide on where to park when we got there! So we ended up following the signs for ‘La Cite’ before taking a wrong turn and ending up on a dead-end outside a school. There was plentiful parking available so we stopped there! Much to the amusement of the school children milling around. (What we discovered when we left, after having to get the van turned round and the car re-hooked up, was that if we HAD carried on around the roundabout there was an actual parking area right there!!)

Anyway we unhooked the car and went off in search of parking closer to ‘La Cite’. We drove around and around the narrow one way system looking – any on-street parking is covered by permits it would appear, but we eventually found a car park by the river where we parked for free. From here it was about a 10 minute walk up to the medieval city.

Entrance to the city and it’s outer walls is free, but once inside you will pay to visit the castle, school museum and any other attractions of interest. The streets are delightful and the church (see main photo) is beautiful. There are the usual souvenir shops in abundance and many, many eateries. There is also, apparently, a haunted house. Close to the castle.

Carcassone. Look closely – there’s a photo-bomber in there!

Back to the van for a quick bacon butty (cue more curious stares from the school kids…!) and then we were back on the road headed for Narbonne.

At this point it was lucky that I’m in the habit of following our route with the map as our Aguri tried to take us down a road that didn’t exist and I realised we were heading away from our destination, so we took over with the 2 phones on Google maps until the Aguri eventually caught up with us.

We chose to stay 2 nights, but it turned out we had little choice anyway as we were affected by the mass protests on fuel duty across the whole of France. We couldn’t even get to the supermarket for milk 😦 And it didn’t stop raining, pretty much, the whole time we were there.

When we couldn’t get to the shop we headed in the opposite direction, towards the sea. At the first roundabout we came too I said ‘we need to go right’, but Calv said ‘I want to go that way’ – up into the mountains! So we did, to see some stunning scenery as we wended our way up, and then back down, the mountain road.

Back at the roundabout we took the road towards Gruissan and Narbonne Plage. We spotted flamingoes out in the lake and a castle up on the hill – so we had to go have a look didn’t we?

Parking up we found our way through the narrow streets to the church and the steps behind leading up to the castle. At first we thought it was closed, but a quick push of the gate and we were in. There’s not much to see but there are wonderful views from the top. Whilst there the wind picked up and the rain didn’t let up, so we headed to an open bar for a quick drink. This particular bar was a sports bar that actually had a betting office on-site!

The umbrella stayed the right way round for once!

On the way back to the site we managed to get milk in the garage as we headed out of Gruissane. We did look to see if the protestors had abandoned their post underneath the bridge, but they hadn’t. They had when we popped out a little later though, but all the shops were shut – we’re not entirely sure that they bothered opening to be fair.

The protestors stopped us from driving in to see Narbonne, and the rain stopped us from cycling, so unfortunately we missed out.

The protestors were still out on Sunday when we left for Spain. We thought at first that they wouldn’t be as they weren’t at 10am, but they soon started appearing. We were held up for about 20 mins whilst trying to get out of Narbonne (tyres burning and everything), and then again around Perpignan – this time for over an hour 😦

Everything seemed to go smoothly after this; even the tolls weren’t overly expensive. It’s best to take the toll road from Perpignan into Spain as otherwise you have to deal with very mountainous terrain – the total cost in tolls from Perpignan to Figueres was 11.50 Euros and it took a whole hour off our journey time!

At this point we started noticing the floods on either side of the roads, whole fields under water. Then about 10 miles away from our site we were barred from taking our required road by a police blockade – that’s all you get though, no diversion or anything! So we had to stop and re-calculate a route, which we did, only to be stopped again. This time the police directed us around the floods, which made for a very interesting 10 minutes or so 🙂 We’d already changed our destination by now as we thought we couldn’t get to l’Estartit, and we were very relieved to pitch up for the night. Ready to head the 10 miles to l’Estartit in the morning.

Toulouse -a French city worth a visit

Leaving Tours we decided that we would have a couple of overnighters on the way south, which meant we stayed at a site, de Montreal, a little south of Limoges. A lovely little site set out of the way on a lake in St Germaine-les-belles. We had chosen to take the toll road from Tours to Poitiers, which we regretted as it came at a cost of over 35 Euros!

The next night was spent in another lovely site, de Bois-Redon, in a village outside of Caussade called Septfond. We then headed down towards Toulouse where we had decided to stay for 2 nights (overnighters are all very well, but, for us, 2 in a row is more than enough!)

Having rocked up just outside of Toulouse we decided that we really should make the effort to go into the city.

We were staying at Les Violettes, a campsite just south of the city (and very close to the Canal du Midi) and managed to find out that we could use a park and ride at Ramonville, about 4 miles away, to get on the metro taking us straight into the heart of the city.

At a cost of 6.10 Euros each we were in the city within an hour of leaving the site – even though both car parks were full when we arrived. Just a little tip here – it is worth waiting at the barriers as people do come and go and the barriers will go up when there are a few spaces available; we waited about 10 minutes and then we were in!

Ramonville is the end of 1 of the 2 metro lines that serve the city, and you change after about 11 stops (at Jean-Jaures) to go to Capitole, which is a good place to start your visit.

This is where you will find the Tourist Information centre (in a rather impressive building), and where you can then head down to see the Hotel de Ville (a much more impressive building – mostly hidden by the preparations for an event whilst we were there, sadly).

Here we sat and had a drink before wandering aimlessly along the narrow streets (buying nougat along the way), before finding Continue reading “Toulouse -a French city worth a visit”

Discovering Chateau de Chenonceoux and Amboise nearby

We moved on towards Tours after leaving la Ferte-Vidame. This route was chosen after much deliberation regarding our route – resulting with us eventually, and reluctantly, deciding to abandon our plan to cross the Millau Viaduct (boooo….); mainly due to the seeming lack of campsites open for us on that route 😦

Having decided on Tours, I thought that we might actually stay for 3 nights, having seen a weather forecast suggesting full sun and a high of 21C on Monday. Sadly it turns out that there are several towns called Tours in France, and my app had decided to provide me with information for a different one, rather than the main town of Tours located in the Loire Valley. So we just stayed for 2 nights after all.

We could have hopped on the cycle path and ridden into Tours to visit the old city (about 4 miles away, with the cycle path passing within about 50m from the site – albeit across a busy road); but we didn’t…

Instead we used our 1 full day there to visit the Chateau de Chenonceaux. There are so many chateaux to choose from to visit; we chose this one as it actually spans the river Cher. It turns out that it is actually a Unesco World Heritage Site.

We paid 14 Euros each to visit the castle and gardens – other attractions within the grounds include a maze, wine cellar (caves), gourmet restaurant, tea-room, self-service restaurant, 16th century farm with carriage musuem and donkeys 🙂

But the main draw is without doubt the castle itself, where many rooms are open to the public. One of the interesting facts we learned was that Continue reading “Discovering Chateau de Chenonceoux and Amboise nearby”

1st few days into France/Spain 2018/19 – Brighton-Newhaven-Dieppe-La Ferte Vidame :)

6th November was the day we left home for our next adventure. We said our goodbyes and waved to the house, with barely a backward glance.. except we had to go straight back before we made it to the motorway as Calv had left his phone behind…!!

1st stop Brighton for an overnight at the Caravan Club site situated just inland from the marina. We had a bite to eat in the marina; a first ever visit to Gourmet Burger Kitchen, and later in the afternoon (although it felt like the evening by the time we came home (by which I mean ‘van’) at about 6.30pm, as it was so dark), we headed into town to visit the Pavilion and the ice skating rink.

We drove around for a while trying to find somewhere to park for less than £10 for 2 hours; on the seafront you will pay £6 for 2 hours closer to Palace Pier, but we parked nearer to West Pier where we paid ‘only’ £4.20 for 2 hours.

I’m glad we did though, as it was just a 15 minute walk back to the Pavilion which looked perfect all lit up for the ice-skating. We didn’t partake (we didn’t want to risk either of us breaking a leg before going away!) but it was great fun to watch. (We have no idea who these lads are in Calv’s photo – but they seem very happy with themselves!!!

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Our ferry was leaving Newhaven at 11.30am so we didn’t have to get up too early – we just headed off about 9.30am and were at the port by 10.15am – so in plenty of time for our crossing. It was a bit rough out there, but I managed to ignore it!! Until we headed out of the safety of the harbour that is… See videos below for a small taster of what we experienced! Continue reading “1st few days into France/Spain 2018/19 – Brighton-Newhaven-Dieppe-La Ferte Vidame :)”

Perfect Port Sunlight and Crosby’s ‘Another Place’

Following our day out in Liverpool (see here for relevant post) our friends arrived onsite and we took the car to visit Port Sunlight (an obsession of mine for some years since seeing it featured on various TV programmes).

Port Sunlight is a model village (not ‘miniature’ model, but ‘ideal’ model) conceived by Lord Leverhulme to house the workers for his Sunlight Soap factory (much like Bourneville was built for Cadbury workers). The houses and surroundings must have seemed like a little slice of heaven for those who were lucky enough to have the opportunity to move there!

Lord Leverhulme also believed in work/life balance (he was years ahead of his time!) and as such provided numerous leisure facilities for his workers and their families – there were schools, social clubs, parks, sports & recreation areas and even an open air swimming pool. There was (is) even a pub, The Bridge Inn, although no alcohol was initially served here. Continue reading “Perfect Port Sunlight and Crosby’s ‘Another Place’”

The wonderful, surprising, simply amazing city of Liverpool

We had headed north specifically to visit Liverpool as we had heard so much about it, and none of it bad.

We stayed on a handy site on The Wirral, Arrowe Brook Farm, which was close enough to public transport links for those without any transport, but we drove to a nearby train station, Hoylake, to park for free and pay a total of £4.90 to take the train into the city..

Alighting at James Street it was just a 5 minute walk to Albert Dock where there is so much going on! There has been a wonderful rejuvenation of this area, including areas in the dock for houseboats & barges and, of course, numerous eateries and bars arrayed around the dock itself. (Whilst waiting for our bus tour we had a quick drink and cake in Puffle Waffle in 1 of the old dock buildings).

Albert Dock, Liverpool (CJS)

Albert Dock, Liverpool (MSP)

Here, you will also find all the bus tours of the city (we opted for the 2 hour Beatles and City tour – more of that later), Continue reading “The wonderful, surprising, simply amazing city of Liverpool”

Chester – Blue Plaque Heaven :)

Finding ourselves with a few extra days away and unable to book into the same site on The Wirral we found an amazing site in Caerwys, North Wales (White Gates – click for my review). What an amazing find! Not just the site itself either – the town is full of history too (and we also liked The Royal Oak – just saying…)

It’s also not too far from Chester – probably 30-40 mins drive. We did drive into the town centre initially but gave up on finding that it would cost £7.80 to park for 3 hours. So we headed back out to one of the Park and Rides (as we had been advised before we even left home…) and made our way in from there (on the bus of course).

Our first view on getting off the bus was the city walls crossing the street with an ornate clock atop the bridge. Very impressive 🙂

Chester August 2018 (12) — Chester City Walls

We also noticed a number of stalls lining the streets as we walked towards the centre. We had chosen Chester Pride day to visit! Continue reading “Chester – Blue Plaque Heaven :)”

UK Campsite Reviews

A brief review of all campsites that we have stayed on in the UK (please bear with me, this is a work in progress! I’m starting with the most recent and working backwards. Eventually I will cover all campsites that we have stayed on over the years 🙂 )
We often use Camping & Caravanning Club certificated sites and occasionally Caravan Club. We also use PitchUp and UKCampsites online to help us find where to stay, if we’re struggling.
Unless we’re trying to cover school holidays (which we’ve now decided we probably don’t need to worry about) we choose our next site a couple of days before moving on!
Just click on the link to see my review for the campsites that we’ve stayed on:-

East Sussex & Kent:

The Cock Inn, Peasmarsh, East Sussex – Near Rye (about 10 miles from Hastings)

Eagles Garth, Beckley, East Sussex – (1-2 miles down the road from The Cock Inn)

Bearstead Caravan Club Site – Near Maidstone (handy for Leeds Castle)

Hampton Bay Park, Herne Bay, North Kent – Herne Bay – handy for Whitstable

Kelseys Camping, Sidcup, Kent – Sidcup – we used it for visiting Chatham and Rochester. Also very handy for visiting London 🙂

East Anglia

D’Arcy Equestrian, Tolleshunt D’Arcy, Maldon, Essex – Maldon – handy for visiting Mersea Island, Tiptree and even Colchester

Fishers Field, Theberton, Suffolk – Nr Aldeburgh. Handy for visiting Thorpeness, Orford, Framlingham. Even Southwold!

Lower Wood Farm, Mautby, Norfolk – Caister on Sea. Handy for Great Yarmouth and for visiting Norwich and the Norfolk Broads

Woodlands Caravan Park, Sheringham (North Norfolk) – Sheringham. Handy for Cromer, Holkham, Wells next the Sea

Highfield Farm Touring, Comberton, Cambridge – Cambridge. Also handy for visiting Ely

King’s Forest Caravan Park, West Stow, Nr. Bury St Edmonds – Bury St Edmonds. Also handy for Newmarket, Thetford, Lakenheath and Lavenham

Northants, Rutland & Lincolnshire

British Grand Prix, Whittlebury Park, Silverstone – Whittlebury. Handy for the British Grand Prix!!

Top Farm, Ryhal, Stamford for Rutland Water – Stamford. Handy for Rutland Water and Burghly House

Fulbeck Waters, Fulbeck, Lincs – Fulbeck. Handy for Lincoln, Grantham & Newark

Canal Farm, Austen Fen nr Louth, Lincs – Louth. Handy for Cleethorpes, Mablethorpe (and numerous other amazing sandy beaches)

Yorkshire & Northumberland (& 2 random sites in Cornwall)

Wold Farm, Flamborough Head – right on the cliffs 🙂 – Flamborough. Handy for Bridlington, Filey & perhaps Pickering for the North Yorks Railway

Trewiston Farm, Rock, Cornwall – Rock. Handy for Padstow, Daymer Bay, Port Isaac, Tintagel (I could go on…. – North Cornwall basically!)

Tregline Farm, nr Polzeath, Cornwall – A couple of miles from Trewiston (if that) so handy for the same places

Teversal Camping & Caravanning, nr Sheffield – Teversal. Handy for the Peak District, Sheffield, Chesterfield and Bolsover Castle

Grantchester Caravan and Camping – Nr York. Also handy for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Old Mother Shipton’s Cave)

Streets Head Caravan Site, nr Aysgarth – Aysgarth. Also handy for West Burton, Hawes, Leyburn, Richmond and the Yorkshire Dales in general 🙂

Fletchers Farm, Great Ayton, North Yorkshire – Great Ayton. Handy for the North York Moors in general (so much to do and see 🙂 )

Wellhouse Farm, Stocksfield nr Hexham and Corbridge – nr Corbridge. Handy for Hexham and Hadrian’s wall attractions

Potland Farm, nr Morpeth – Ashington nr Morpeth. This is where we stayed when we visited Cragside.

Brock Mill Farm, nr Lindisfarne – Beal on the road to Holy Island (Lindisfarne). Also handy for Berwick on Tweed.

Scotland

Dunbar Camping and Caravanning – Dunbar. Also handy for Edinburgh.

Thirlestane Castle, Lauder – Handy for Jedburgh, Selkirk and Kelso (Floors Castle)

Lake District

Hill of Oaks, Bowness-on-Windermere – Bowness on Windermere. The Lake District 🙂

Blackpool

Bluebell Cottage, Knott End, nr Blackpool – Knott End. Handy for Blackpool & Fleetwood

Our Favourite Beaches and Seaside Resorts in the UK

That the UK has some stunning countryside is accepted by all, but our beaches? Many people aren’t aware of just how beautiful many of our beaches really are – a friend who has just visited Devon & Cornwall commented that you wouldn’t expect to see the beaches that they’d found in the UK! Read this to discover some of the must see beaches and resorts in the UK.

I think we all have a favourite beach, but that doesn’t, of course, mean that this is the best beach in the country! We can’t all visit them all can we? So this is my selection of our favourite beaches that we have visited in the UK – so far 🙂

Note, these are OUR favourites, and therefore I feel it’s only fair to fess up to the fact that I’m not a fan of pebbly beaches. So, even though some pebbly beaches are stunning they’re unlikely to feature in our favourites as I would aim for a sandy beach over a pebbly one any day of the week 🙂 Maybe I’ll do a separate list for pebbly beaches one day!!

My favourite features are beach huts (the quirkier the better), a good old fashioned pier, a nice promenade and beautiful clean sand and water. These are to be found in abundance all around the coast here in the UK. (Note: not having a blue flag designation does not mean a beach and it’s water aren’t clean…)

I have missed out so many beaches (there are numerous lovely examples in Norfolk – from Mundsley to California, Lincolnshire – from Cleethorpes to Skegness, Yorkshire – Saltburn to Robin Hoods Bay, Northumberland – Newbiggin to Spittal, Dorset – Bournemouth to Swanage, Cornwall – too many to mention! and not to forget Devon where my childhood memories are of Blackpool Sands, Dartmouth, and where I first swam without armbands in Bigbury Bay (where the beach scenes in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang were filmed). Or Wales where all the beaches I’ve ever visited are stunning (Tenby (see no. 10 below), Saundersfoot, Pendine, those on the Gower peninsula and North Wales too), and, of course, the Isle of Wight (right on our doorstep). I’m look forward to visiting Liverpool and the Wirral in a few weeks to see what they have to offer us on the North East Coast 🙂

Also I am able to say that we have actually visited all the beaches featured on the following pages – so again I am quite sure there are others that you might include – please feel free to share!

Before you look through my choices I have to say that a couple of other beaches deserve a special mention (I decided to stick with a Top 10 but can’t resist these):-

Filey, East Yorkshire – good old fashioned seaside resort with a surprising amount of history

Southwold, Suffolk – what a surprisingly lovely resort. A unique pier, no amusement arcades – just a lovely promenade along the seafront and a charming little town with a rather lovely fish and chip shop! The Little Fish & Chip Shop No wonder it topped a poll of the UK’s favourite seaside resorts!

View from the end of the pier at Southwold

Scarborough, East Yorkshire – Specifically the quieter North Bay, overlooked by the castle high up on the hill that divides the 2 bays.

20170803_171521 — Overlooking Scarborough beach and harbour

Weymouth, Dorset – the sand may well be imported but this is a lovely south coast resort with a permanent sand art display on the beach.

And, finally, the main picture was taken, believe it or not, on the outskirts of Cleethorpes in Lincolnshire! We were NOT expecting this 🙂

Now, read on for images and comments on our top 10 favourite beaches 🙂

Cycle ride to Portchester Castle

This is the 1st time we have actually cycled to Portchester Castle (despite the fact that we only live a couple of miles away…)

And what a beautiful day we chose to do it! We headed off down the hill and took the road towards the water. We first visited Wicor Marine from where you can access the Salt Café, sitting directly on the shores of Fareham Creek and well worth a visit for a cuppa and a slice of cake (or perhaps even a glass of wine 🙂 ).

(There is actually a lovely walk around Fareham Creek that can be started from the café (or the castle itself), that takes you around the golf course at Cams Hall (covering much of the Fareham park run route). Click here for details.

Having stopped by Calv’s sister’s for a cuppa and some oil for Calv’s bike chain we took the path along the shoreline as far as Hospital Lane where we emerged into the heart of old Portchester. The path was good (although there is a bit with steep drops on either side, 1 down to the shingle beach, the other a grassy ditch, so if you’re not very confident on your bike you would probably get off and walk here!) The views are just lovely, particularly on a beautiful sunny day (which we are experiencing so many of at the moment 🙂 )

View from our ride along the shore of Fareham Creek towards Portchester Castle

At the end of the path you can continue straight to the castle along the shore – although a short section is on the beach so it’s not really suitable for cycling. Therefore when you get to the end of the fence separating the shore from the lane down to Turret House, turn left to go up Hospital Lane, where you will found a couple of lovely old houses. The view of Castle Street when you get to the top is lovely 🙂 (I didn’t take a picture as on a sunny Sunday afternoon the cars have sort of taken over!)

From here it’s just a short hop to the castle (about 20 seconds on bikes, maybe 2 mins if you’re on foot. Continue reading “Cycle ride to Portchester Castle”