Road Trip....The Journey

Well...this is the start of our road trip holiday log...


(love this...taken from Pinterest...website is on the bottom of picture)




I wanted to start with the journey and do it as a whole rather than repeat myself for each day...


Over the complete trip we did roughly 1000 miles....this was our route...




Its not the best photo of the map...the stars are our destinations and stop overs for the evenings...


Starting in the Heart Of England where we live...which is as far away from the seaside as you can get...I was longing for beaches, sand, sounds of the waves and sea shells haha...so Hubs arranged the trip to take in as much coast as we could :))


Morecambe was the first stop of the day...then over night in Kendall
The Lakes were day two including the Lancashire coast and over night in Cockermouth
Gretna Green day three then travelling up to Ayr over night
Day four was a long day from Ayr to Dundee...taking in Gleneagles, Carnoustie and Dundee itself
Day five on to St Andrews and Berwick On Tweed over night
Another long drive on day six...to Whitby, Robin Hoods Bay and Scarborough for the evening stop
And then back home again :((


Going on the road is not one of my favourite things to do...in fact I hate traffic...I get real anxiety and I always fear the worst...I'm definitely a 'home bird' so all of this was really taking me out of my comfort zone...but I had a positive attitude that all was going to be ok... I would occupy myself taking everything in...


I sat in the back of the car with Puppy Dog...which helped a lot as it made me focus on the scenery etc instead of the road...and to be honest it was okay...after the first day I really enjoyed it and once we had got passed Manchester the traffic just disappeared! Traffic was light and it was a very easy going drive...once in Scotland it was just so peaceful on the roads that is was a pleasure...I imagine much like it must have been many moons ago before every family member had a car :)


As I mentioned earlier doing each journey would be boring as very much of it was the same...I occupied myself making shapes in the clouds going by...most of which I could turn into puppy dogs or rabbits or flowers either way I was happy in my world...as many of you who know me I can be a little 'away with the fairies' most of the time haha...






I was suitably impressed with the amount of flora around on the hedgerows and verges of the roads...lots and lots of flowers...Ox Eye Daisies, Poppies, Foxgloves, Buttercups, Daisies, Wild Marigolds, Cow Parsley...the list goes on :)...hedgerows full of abundant Elderflowers...slowing turning to the berries...then the odd fully in bloom Rhododendron would crop up which was a lovely surprise...along with beautiful Honeysuckles...it made me wonder how they got there...via birds and other little creatures I suppose :)...in Scotland I'm sure I saw banks of Lupins...all different shades...they could have been foxgloves... but I'm certain they were Lupins! :)


We passed through little villages, towns and some cities (didn't like the cities much haha)...lush green hills, mountains in the distance and our gorgeous farm land everywhere...just being able to observe the farmers going about their daily work a proper 'snapshot' of rural life...many taking advantage of the fine weather...gathering in the hay and the bailer making big fat sausage bundles...cows going along their route to the milking parlour...there was one cow making her way across a bridge all alone so she was either very early or very late haha...it made my heart sing to see that many of the farms had left Wild Flower borders to their land...it just looked so pretty and so good for those honey bees of ours and other little critters <3...




We noticed that a lot of the small villages had bunting strung from all the houses and street lamps...villagers had flags streaming from their windows and the little shops had all joined in too...not really sure whether they were celebrating something or they just like having the bunting fluttering (I'm secretly hoping the latter is the case, although it was more likely to be support for a team or village fete)...but I loved it all...I would have bunting up all the time...it just makes you happy.. the best thing I liked was the sense of community it was great to see that everyone had pulled together to celebrate :))


We witnessed some breath taking, beautiful houses and gardens on our travels...talk about location, location, location...there were some stunners and in the most beautiful of places...what a dreamy outlook some of them had...some had sea views, some the lush green hills...to wake up to those every day would be like heaven :)...it struck me that many people who live in these beauty spots probably don't even notice what's around them anymore because they are so used to it...we can all be a bit guilty of that I suppose...I hope they do take the time to look at it all through fresh eyes sometimes...and feel that beauty that we experience...


Another love of mine is Dry Stone Walls...I just think they are so beautiful...so solid and structured yet the stones just look like they have toppled into place...such a skill to this...they looked stunning carving up the landscape like a patchwork quilt...the way they just blend in with their surroundings so gorgeously...I love a hedgerow but give me a dry stone wall any day :))






We did cross our fair share of bridges...one of which was the Forth Bridge...which I found most exciting although the weather that day was simply awful...so no good photos...just this very wet one!




Now I know Wind Turbines can be controversial...some see them as a blot on the landscape and we did see a lot of them both on land and in the sea...strangely I quite liked them...they sort of stood proud...I found them quite calming...we do have some close by where we live but  I have no idea what its like to live close to one...so I don't know if they are noisy or disruptive...but for me they didn't take away from the beauty of the land...



I did try and take some photos from the back of car whilst travelling...especially when the weather was a bit wild...as I wasn't getting out to take them haha...



On the day we were leaving the Lakes on up into to Scotland...the weather was particularly awful...it was the day that the whole of country had rain pouring all day...it was still very atmospheric besides that...none of the beauty was lost...the hills were covered in low cloud and mist...by the afternoon the rain had stopped...the clouds started to lift...it reminded me of the film 'Brigadoon'...the villages were appearing from the mist before our eyes! haha






I have a lot of similar photos to the next...you could guarantee that every time you pressed the shutter on the camera a tree would appear...to obscure the view...haha






Some of the road signs made us smile...villages with obscure funny names would appear...my favourite was....






The Land of Nod! I would love to have address like that!...


So all in all I can safely say that we live in a beautiful Country...a green and pleasant land as the saying goes...and I know we have our fair share of nasty things happening in our world and all over this planet...but I feel truly blessed to have taken this trip around parts of Britain that I have never visited before...to have witnessed the beauty around us...we will definitely be doing this again...in fact we wanted to pack up the next day and go on another straightaway!

I will end this first page of our trip with some thank yous...

Thank you Hubs for organising such a wonderful holiday...it has to the best I've ever had...don't know how you are going to top this! :))

Thank you Puppy Dog for being such a good girl...it was your first moving about holiday and you handled it really well...I think you enjoyed it as much as we did...

And finally...thank you Radio 2 for keeping us entertained...its been ages since I listened to you for long periods of time...so thank you Ken Bruce and Steve Wright and also I will say thank you to Jeremy Vine...I HATE news based shows...but even you managed to entertain Hubs...with me shouting at you and your guests when I disagreed with what you were saying...haha....

So that's the journey over...I will be posting about each day soon.....





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