Adventures With Harvey

A holiday from our holiday

Greetings once again from the land of leeks, sheep and rugby. Yes the Woodies are back in South Wales & having a few days to catch our breath before the next phase of our adventure begins. It’s now been almost exactly 3 months since we left home, and previous editions of this publication will attest that the pace between then and now has been reasonably frenetic. We’ve seen such a lot and had so many amazing experiences however of late we travelling Woodies have been feeling a little weary. Which may sound odd, we’re not working and are on holiday after all - in fact I think we've concluded that the main wearying factor has been the lack of a Harvey and spending such a lot of time making alternative plans, sorting out where we're going next, accommodation, rental cars, ferries etc. Not that any of these items on their own are particularly difficult or troublesome, it’s just a lot of decision making and things to figure out all the time. It also means we often don’t have much certainty of plans beyond the next day or three – which in some ways is refreshing but in others tiresome.

The last blog ended with the Woodies arriving in Sidmouth on the South Coast where we ended up staying for 4 nights. It’s the most delightful little seaside town and the weather was fine and warm during our stay. The flat we stayed in had considerable history all of its own, the initial construction dating from 1776 – take a look at the plaque in the photos below for more info if you’re interested.

Although the holiday from our holiday started in Sidmouth, we couldn’t help taking one day out to explore. Not far down the road is the town of Dartmouth, home to the Britannia Royal Naval College where, for several centuries, the vast majority of the Royal Navy Top Brass received their training. However, Dartmouth was pretty much the last stop of the day and there is plenty more to tell you about before that!

Our first stop in fact was Greenway, the summer house of one Agatha Christie who, we discovered, is the 3^rd highest grossing author of all time – only The Bible (not exactly a single ‘author’ but top of the list) and William Shakespeare are ahead of her. The home was beautifully restored and shown as it would have been when Agatha and her family lived there in the 1930’s, 40’s and 50’s, however even for a literary ignoramus, places such as this really are well worth a look. Anita, on the other hand, told me she went through an Agatha Christie phase in her teens reading many of her books, and would often stay up late into the night finishing one tome or another. For her the visit was a fascinating opportunity to step inside the mind of one of her favourite authors. Given Ms Christie mainly wrote murder mysteries, let’s hope the rekindling of Anita's fandom doesn’t extend too far and your faithful correspondent survives henceforth!

From there it was a short trip down the road to Kingswear where we boarded a genuine coal-fired steam train for the 30 minute trip up the track to Paignton. Sitting in one of these old carriages truly felt like travelling back through time, everything from the seats themselves to the smell of the coal smoke in the tunnels to the old-school conductor making his way through the carriage and clipping everyone’s tickets. During the ride we got chatting with an older gentleman sitting in the adjacent seat who shared his memories of riding in such trains as a small boy. In each compartment where one carriage joins another there is a window and he explained how he and the other lads would stick their heads out the window much as a dog does in a car… and arrive home with blackened faces from the coal soot! He was from Chester and told us about the cathedral there which dates back to 1091. “And if you happen to be in town on a Wednesday…” he added, “please do stop by as I’m the cathedral guide on a Wednesday.”

We expect to be in the northern part of England later in the year so will definitely plan to stop by Chester Cathedral on a Wednesday if we can! Although Paignton is by the ocean, it’s a town with a vastly different demographic from Sidmouth - let's just say that it may perhaps be just a little past it's heyday. Enough said.

From there we carried on the round trip by bus which took us to the small town of Totnes which was the start of our riverboat ride down the Dart River. The skipper was also a fantastic tour guide and gave us excellent commentary, interspersed with plenty of humour. Because the Dartmouth area has for many years been an important seagoing hub, many familiar names have had an association with the area in centuries gone by including Sir Walter Raleigh and others. Have any of you heard of the Domesday Book? I hadn’t prior to this trip however it was effectively a census completed by William the Conqueror and co in the late 11^th century, mainly so they knew what taxes they could collect and from whom. It has survived down through the ages and these days is a document of massive historical significance because it lists every city, town, village, hamlet etc and their populations at that time. We passed a settlement called Duncannon that is just a couple of houses together on the side of the river - the skipper explained that normally settlements of this size are known as hamlets however apparently there was a transcribing error in the doomsday book (modern spelling) listing the population as 100 instead of 10. This meant it was categorised as a village when in fact the actual population was only that of a small hamlet. So between then and now, it’s been known as England’s smallest village.

The trip concluded with our arrival into Dartmouth where a cold refreshment was called for. Sitting there on the waterfront looking at all the colours and vibrancy of Kingswear across the water was an absolute treat, just magic! By the time our vessels were empty we were too late for the last passenger ferry so walked onto the car ferry which crosses the small gap between the 2 towns. For our Bay of Islands readers, the ferry was about the same size as the little old spare Opua-Okiato ferry however this one wasn’t self-propelled. It had another vessel roped alongside to act like a tugboat – it was quite a pantomime backing the ferry out, then turning the tugboat around so it could push rather than pull. Finally we headed back to Sidmouth and arrived at the local pub just in time to get our dinner order in before the kitchen closed at 9pm.

Although it sounds like rather a large day, that’s been pretty much been the only day out exploring between the last blog and now. Of course, we had some lovely walks around Sidmouth and your author also had a most enjoyable afternoon watching test cricket at the local pub (apart from the result of course ☹) and making friends with the locals. We were sad to leave our lovely little apartment however before heading inland we had one more stop to make. Prior to leaving NZ, a good friend in Russell mentioned the town of Budleigh Salterton where his grandparents lived and he regularly visited as a young lad. And it was well worth the short detour! Another gorgeous little seaside settlement and again, the weather was beautiful with loads of people out sunbathing. However, unlike most NZ beaches there was no sand, just entirely rocks a little like Napier however the lack of sand certainly didn’t seem to be deterring the sunbathers!

There was a small amount of shopping to be done so we stopped briefly at Exeter on the way north before continuing onto what seems to have become our travel hub; Newport. This is for 2 reasons, firstly some good friends live there and are always most welcoming & hospitable. And the second is the good lads there at Anglo American Autocare are sorting the troublesome Harvey out for us. As it had been a few weeks since we’d seen the old chap it was good to stop by to refresh our suitcases and collect a few items needed for the next little while. Next time we see Harvey we expect that he’ll be all sorted and ready to re-join our adventure (fingers, toes and everything else crossed).

So it was 2 nights at Newport and now we’re having 3 here at a friend’s farm cottage in the Welsh Valleys. We had a weekend here earlier in the trip and it’s just idyllic with plenty of birdlife, sheep, chooks, and… since we were last here… a new puppy called Blue who is 11 weeks old. His owners and we visitors cannot figure out whether his cuteness exceeds his naughtiness or vice versa!

Friday 24 June has always been our first ‘anchor’ date, in other words somewhere we had to be on a particular date – in this case Munich. A couple of years back my folks, Murray and Laurice, sadly had an overseas holiday postponed due to the nasty C word. For several reasons they have (again sadly) been unable to complete the trip at all so have had most of their money refunded. However, one coach tour was non-refundable but could be transferred to your grateful author and his wife, so starting this coming Friday we will be touring the Imperial Capitals of Europe for 10 nights, including Budapest, Prague, Vienna, Bratislava and others, concluding with the Oberammergau passion play. You probably haven’t heard of it but this small town is transformed every 10^th year (although in this case it’s been 12 years) into a huge theatrical production depicting the passion of Christ which has a season lasting several months. The play has been performed in the town every 10^th year since 1633 in gratitude to the Good Lord for delivering them from some pestilence or other. It will be a interesting to see a play in German and we're so much looking forward to the remainder of the tour!!! Our plan was to park Harvey up in or near Munich for the duration however Plan B has been enacted and we’ll be catching the train to London on Wednesday before flying to Germany from there.

That’s pretty much all the news for now from a refreshed couple of travelers who are full of anticipation about the next phase of their adventures. All of the countries we’ll be visiting on the tour will be new for your faithful correspondent so you can be sure there will be much excited reporting in the next couple of editions!

With much love to all this is AW(out)H signing off!