Part 2 UK trip

Ok so these posting are an indulgence, not much about the boat but was the lead up to our trip, forgive me.

We left Plymouth to drive back to East Midlands airport where Don took his flight to see his Mum and sister Lisbet in Glasgow. He stayed for 4 days while I stayed with Mum again in Weston Coyney.

Mum and I went out for dinner at Spot Gate a pub restaurant where they have very old railway carriages as dining rooms, all very cosy with huge comfy chairs. I seem to remember the place many years ago it was always so busy you have to book way in advance but we were quite lucky. While I was at Mums the weather did it's usual thing, hailed again just to remind me of what I'm missing about the UK.

I'm sure the UK saves the hail for my arrival 

Mum eating lunch at the "Spotgate" in the old railway carriage 

Just as it used to be

After leaving Mums to collect Don from East Midlands we drove to Birdham Marina near Chichester, its the oldest marina in the UK. We stayed with Steve and Lizzie on Seraph they made us very welcome. We slept on the table in the saloon not under it lol, quite comfortable though. On the Saturday we all went to the Southampton boat show which was pretty quiet, quite a relief though as we had lots to do, we ordered the self steering Hydravane which should keep us on track, we hope. That will be delivered to us in Gibraltar where Don will install it. When we returned to the marina we had an amazing surprise, there was a spitfire flying about performing a smashing show, Steve said they had arranged it just for us, hmm.

Don with Lizzie walking about in Birdham marina

We bought quite a bit from the show and had to return the following day and bought even more, I think we carried so much stuff we grazed our knuckles on the ground. On the Saturday night we walked through the lanes to a restaurant to eat and have a few drinks, staggered back to the boat and quaffed a bottle of bubbly.
On the Sunday night we had booked into the Holiday Inn hotel which is quite close to the airport. John our friend came to us and loaded up all the goodies we had bought so that made things so much easier to return. The taxi was waiting our delayed flight at Murcia and bought us safely back here.

There is so much more to tell about the trip but time is so very short now.
We plan to leave Cartagena on Monday and just hope the weather will be kind to us, we are booked into Gibraltar on the 8th Of October.

Next post soon
Byeeeee