Tuesday, 10 April 2018

Devon Dorset Spring 18

Friday 6th April, 2018

Orcombe Point above Exmouth with pyramid of the different rocks we'll pass through. Cold and windy but dry unlike the last 2 weeks which have been biblical and we'll find that out in the amount of mud.


One of many holiday camps which look favela like from a distance. Look a lot more luxurious closer up. Probably as many large camps as towns along the route.


Typical Devon rock faces. The sea turns red for a few hundred yards out then suddenly turns to blue (or grey dependent on weather).


Fossilised plant roots which had dug through the mud of the time.


Budleigh Salterton pebble beach typical of the region.


Rising again - it's all up and down today.


Typical inaccessible bay. Unless you're into rock climbing on crumbling rocks.


Ladram Bay looking east to Sidmouth.


Stacks sitting in the sea at Ladram Bay.


You're never far from a long drop into the ocean.


Duncan at Ladram Bay.


Stack a stone's throw from the beach.


Where we've come from in mid afternoon.


Sun's going in.


Grass, wood, lichen, grass


Rising up again to the Iron Age fort of High Peak which has a lot of flint.


Atop High Peak.


Typical view south - sea's still red.


Saturday 7th April, 2018

Above Seaton and another dry day.


Red cliffs giving way to white (chalk?) with granite (?) blocks.


Massive cliffs where you can see all the different strata and caves. Most of the walk is along old land slides with luxuriant vegetation.


Garlic fields - memories of the Cotswolds.


It's been pretty muddy along the way and very muddy in parts. The worst is yet to come as some sections are Glastonbury Festival like for hundreds of yards at a time. Slow walking.


The mud's worth it with views like this.


Stacks turned from red to white.


Climbing again.


Great views - of cliffs about to calf.


Rookery.


Start of Undercliff of Doom. No way back! It's as arduous as the guides say (why did we scoff?!) and we only just reach Lyme Regis by nightfall.


Amazing vegetation under the cliffs, unfortunately most time is spent watching the path.


Undercliff forest.


Sunday 8th April, 2018

Our Lyme hotel on the Cobb. Were we glad to see it last night!


Looking back to Lyme.


After getting lost after Charcombe, due to various deviations due to cliff land slides, looking towards Golden Cap. We've not seen the sea since Lyme.


Up Golden Cap at 627 feet the highest point on the south coast. It felt it going up it. Not as desolate as it seems and we lunch here.


Where we're headed from Golden Cap.


Seatown - our local beach when we stayed in Dorset a few years ago. Just looked it up - was 5 years ago. How time flies...


As they say in these parts, what goes down must go up...


Hardy gorse.


And hardier trees. You can tell which way the wind blows... from the south west.


Thornecombe Beacon.


We're headed somewhere into the distance. At the midway point at West Bay we have a choice of 4 or 5 hours to Abbotsbury and risking last food orders at the 2 pubs, or a beer at the local and bus to Abbotsbury with a relaxing evening. Latter won out.


Monday 9th April, 2018.

Folly chapel at Abbotsbury.


Fleet lagoon and Chesil Beach. This is the morning's view when not looking at muddy paths.


We stop for a cuppa at a typically muddy spot. As it gets worse and worse we cut off into Weymouth early.


Sunday, 31 December 2017

Berlin Xmas 17

Saturday we get up at a very civilised time to take the taxi to Heathrow laden with bags and despite the warning of chaos on the roads two days before Christmas we get there in more than plenty of time. At Berlin Tegel we're picked up by Lutz, Johanna and Levi in their big van, after one of our bags broke the luggage conveyor belt. We meet Hilde, brother and boyfriend on the house boat that is our home for the week and after sharing a bottle of champagne we and Lutz go to a Christmas market in an old brewery yard. It gets us in the Christmas spirit drinking gluhwein, with added local brandy of course, and eating various Germanic delicacies such as chips and chestnuts. I'm not gonna lie Lily-Rose had a chocolate covered banana on a stick. Driven back home by Lutz we chat and snack til bedtime.

Sunday starts slowly and after a leisurely breakfast we explore the boat in the daylight. It's pretty big and must have been a goods boat. Nicely done out and it's lovely looking out over the water and seeing the ducks swimming about. It's a murky day but dry and not too cold. We head off to the Gendarmenmarkt which is a lovely square surrounded by churches and a concert hall and the middle of which is a big Christmas market. It's lovely wandering around on Xmas Eve and the Germans are very lively as this is their big day. A bit more gluhwein and fantastic sweet potato chips with a tofu chilli topping sets us up well. After drifting home, it gets dark early, we flop out for Debbie to read the traditional Xmas Eve book and then to watch Elf.

The boat

Debs ahoy!

Basking in the Berlin sun

Xmas Market

Boat yard

Trail to the boat

Girls take over Jack's room

Prost!

Christmas Day and we're up pretty early to open presents, blow bubbles all over the boat and then we go into Berlin, of course the trains run all day, to eat at die Schule which is fairly up market and swish. Jack has schnitzel, Lily-Rose a fish dish and Debbie, Maya and myself a few veggies and spuds sauteed. Tastes nice enough but as I'd told them of our vegan and gluten free ness I'd expected that they'd have something ready. Ah well it tasted nice enough. Lutz joins us as he's back from his parents we come back home with him to play games and open beer bottles with anything other than a bottle opener which is a traditional German thing to do. Our highlight, rather Lutz and Maya's, is using the pack of cards and only slightly denting Nirvana. Then it's Cool Runnings which Lutz leaves before the exciting climax.

Christmas bubbly fun

Best present ever brought by Santa

Arty shot

Arty shot pt 2 - all new today!

Boxing Day we go to Lutz's place to meet Tina and her twins and have a fabulous typical German brunch in which every square inch, sorry, centimetre, of the table is laden with delicacies. We then wander up where the wall was and go into town to see the wall covered in graffiti and see four odd girls dancing outside their car to dodgy 80s pop. Ah well takes all types. We take afternoon tea in the Ramones museum, did they realise they'd spawn a near vegan cafe? and then wander through Kreutzberg to the Punk Rock Pizzeria where we eat magnificent pizzas in a noisy and friendly crowded atmosphere surrounded by band posters and signatures. After confusing the poor waiter by using six different, and badly spoken, languages we part with Lutz and make our way home to rest.

Getting ready...
Posing in the back yard

Lutz's hallway

View from the watchtower near Lutz's

Watching out

Pester power!

On your marks...
Go!
  
Tina's kids know how to travel in style...

For sure!

East side wall - wet (and our only photo of Lutz!)

Tasteful mural on east side wall

The kids love the Berlin S bahn...

Wednesday starts with a beautifully sunny morning but soon clouds over but at least it's not raining although it's getting progressively colder throughout the week. We meet Lutz down town to visit the expensive buy by weight second hand shop then go to Alexandraplatz for charity shopping / adoption cafe coffee drinking. Afterwards we search out a vegan currywurst place, meat also offered, and  stand on the pavement eating them and chips in the cold like true Berliners. Then more successful shopping at the St Pauli shop & trendy shops then to Potsdammer Platz to get lost in the Jewish holocaust memorial then to the Brandenburg Gate with the chariot now facing East. We leave Lutz and go round the Reichstag building with it's magnificent views of the night lights of Berlin from the glass dome. Back home for supper just catching Aldi open.

Yum - strawberries in chocolate

Brandenburg Gate - facing East

Trying to get arrested

Reichstag

Lights of Berlin
View from Reichstag

Another view from the Reichstag

Thursday it's definitely cooling down and we meet Lutz and Levi aka Little Nipper on his bike at Treptower Park where we take in the impressive Soviet War Memorial and wander through the park past the old fun fair and summer retreats, complete with outdoor showers, before S-Bahning back into town. At one of the stops we hear a massive bang which sound quite close. Lutz assures us it's just a firework which are popular coming up to New Years Eve. We hear lots of others after this. Apparently the one time that German safety standards are completely and universally ignored. After eating at a very tasty and reasonably priced oriental place we wander round the old Jewish quarter before coming home and eschewing a night out in Berlin. I think the lack of sunlight and cold and all that walking is taking it's toll on us young ones. Ahem.


Treptower Park on the Spree

Treptower bridge to island

Fascinating ducks

Treptower Soviet memorial gardens

Soviet saviour of Germany, East

Crushing the swastika
Finally Levi gets to open his present - he's been very patient today!

Friday's our last full day and it's beautifully sunny out. The sun being something we've not seen for a few days now. Seems to be a lot of sirens going up and down the road between us and the local prison and we're wondering if something's going on. We metro over to the Olympic Stadium where we wander around the stadium itself and outside looking at the broken bell with swastikas, the small ageing swimming and diving pools and the names of winners of the events. Surprisingly few compared with the myriad events of today. Jesse Owens is up there a few times. The stadium is pretty impressive with it's modern roof and we see the moon perfectly aligned as you look down towards the arched part of the roof. Not sure the photos managed to capture what the eye could see. Lutz informs us by phone that five prisoners have escaped from the prison near us, which explains the sirens earlier. Just hoping they're not holed up in the boat... After coffee we come back into town to Lutz and Johanna's then off to meet Tina and family for a delicious asian meal. Afterwards we find a pub which can only accommodate all 12 of us in a downstairs room which turns out to be the smoking room. A few potential smokers are deterred by the kids' presence but towards the end of our 2nd round we have a crowd of smokers at one end. Time to leave. En route to the tube I try out a Berlin pissoir and have some odd bloke chat to me, either that or he's talking on his phone. It's hard to tell these days. Back home for our last night on the boat.

Olympic Swimming Pool

Olympic Stadium with modern Star Wars roof and the moon in alignment if you look closely

Olympic stadium with moon

Johanna in the post dinner smoking room
Saturday is murky again and the boat is chilly. We wake up slowly and pack before Hilde comes round to say Hi. Then Lutz Johanna and Little Nipper come to pick us up and taxi us to the airport for an unreasonably long wait until we board our delayed flight back to the UK. We just about negotiate customs having lost a passport (I won't say who) and we all part with Jack and Maya taking the tube back to north London and me Debbie and Lily-Rose get a taxi home. A lovely trip and great way to spend Christmas. Made all the better by Lutz and Johanna's hospitality and Lutz's underground Berlin site seeing. Thanks guys and see you in the summer!


Our bed

Our bedroom

Our London German bathroom