from brighton to blackpool...it's the people you meet

While we were sitting on a bench in Brighton, we met the most morally confused homeless guy ever. After insulting a nearby busker by way of introduction, he asked us for a cigarette then told us his life story. Which included gun point robbery of an alarming number of post offices, two murders and a 30 year jail sentence. He also lectured us on how precious life is and in his very next breath told us he could kill us as well. Then we decided we probably had to go somewhere else that wasn't near him. He got very offended by this. So we either met an incredibly sane looking raving lunatic or a self-righteous murderer. Still not sure.

We also met some good old-fashioned non-homcidal people in Brighton. Mostly they were cool young post-grads doing creative things and living in filthy sharehouses. We filled our short time in this city by the sea going for (very) long walks on the beach, avoiding murderers (ok, one murderer) on the street, listening to talented MCs and poets fight it out slam style in a very crowded pub and cafe hopping to avoid the rain. England and rain is like night and darkness...an infatuation with wet is what you need if you are considering a life here.

We'd finished exploring (that's not true but our short time had run out) this vibrant seaside city of the south and we jumped on a bus for a 10 hour journey up north, to another seaside holiday town called Blackpool. But not before we had experienced the worst coffee I have ever encountered. It was literally undrinkable- we both forced down 3 or 4 sips and then decided no coffee was better than fighting the urge to vomit and threw them away. (I later tried to redeem this experience by buying two ridiculous chocolate concoctions from Starbucks, which Will deemed disgusting so I decided to drink both, spilled half all over myself whilst trying to manouvre around in the bus seat and then felt incredibly sick for the rest of the journey.

As we wearily alighted into the night of Blackpool, the very first thing we saw was a fairly vicious physical fight between two girls who were surrounded by a group of laughing morons ahem 'young men'. We had just spent 10 chocolate soaked hours on a bus to get here so you can imagine what we were feeling...

And although the very last image I have of Blackpool is of the group of young lads stumbling around the streets shirtless (this is English winter), very very unsoberly, at five-thirty on a Saturday afternoon, the time in between these two encounters was actually quite nice (we were staying outside of the actual town of Blackpool...perhaps this helped).  

We had decided to venture to this part of Britain for 3 reasons: we had seen a lot of the south and a lot of the south was flooded, we were flying to Cyprus from Manchester airport, and we were visiting some lovely people we met in Spain who said we could stay with them if we made it to England. We had only known them for 3 days- they are friends of James and Cathy, with whom we wwoofed for a month- and they welcomed us into their lives like we were long-lost friends come to stay. It was lovely. They are Tracy and Julie and they took us out for some amazing Italian food at the type of restaurant that is full purely on the merit of the food, they got us free entry into Blackpool's biggest tourist attraction the 'Blackpool Tower' and they insisted we come back and stay upon our return from Cyprus. We also met Tracy's two daughters, one of whom was a carer for elderly people and subsequently regaled us with almost unbelievable tales of octonegarian cunning (one lady switched her husband's false teeth glue with super glue to "get him to shutup!"- they had been married for 70 years and had apparently expected they would be long dead by now), and her dogs, Ruby and Dixon, two huge, slobbery, lovable boxers. 

As for what we did while in Brighton?...sheltered from a lot of rain (surprised?), did some knitting (Will), made brownies and lemon tart (me) and wandered around the slightly sad centre of Blackpool...being a seaside holiday town it isn't really the place to be in the middle of winter. It had the feel of a closed down carnival- the kids have all gone home, the popcorn and ice-cream is finished and there are just a few bored carnies hanging around, hoping to trick the few tourists who wander past unsuspectingly. 

We also visited Manchester, which is a very welcoming sized city with much live music, theatre, graffiti and hip youngsters. We sampled lots of food and coffee and spent the evening watching the opening night of four short plays by four different playwrights (unfortunately the rain bested us yet again, as it slowly drenched us while we wandered around for at least an hour searching for the theatre, after which we discovered was not actually within walking distance at all...it was a damper evening than I normally prefer for a night of theatre).

And here are some pictures of our exploits...

Brighton!

We found the original(?) Mad Mouse! It looks just as death-trappy as ours.

In the middle of a most thoughful birthday present...

The menace of the ocean in Blackpool

Manchester...

The famous ballroom at the Blackpool Tower

And how windy it was whilst we were there- that pole is usually straight.

Now we are in North Cyprus, which I can happily say has been bathed in sunshine for nearly every single day of the last three weeks. But more later. 

mince pies, moors and some very happy ducks.

I just had a look at my last post about Devon...it's massive...and I see I managed to slip a little Bath trivia lesson in there. Read up, there'll be a quiz later. But this one will be less of an investment of your time, I promise.

With a bagful of home-made gifts and a couple of jars of home-made fruit mince under my arms (I had a lot of time on my hands before christmas...), we delved deeper into Devon, to a little town called Winkleigh where some more of Will's extended family live. On the night before christmas we arrived at a wonderful thatched, converted barn- there were ruins to explore, baking to be done (and a subsequent truck-load of mince pies to be eaten) and table tennis to be played so we were all very happy.

On christmas morning we woke to pancakes and bacon, a surprise bag of very thoughtful gifts each and the promise of an enormous lunch. Will was oblivious to all this though; being finally allowed to play with his (christmas present) yoyo after pestering me all week for it, he did little else the rest of the day.

If you don't call the underside of a rock home, you will know about the fairly hefty amount of moisture this little island has been drowning in of late. Fantastic for the ducks and their brethren; not awesome for two Australians who are keen on sunshine. It does mean though that when the skies do stop crying, we are outside before you can say 'hey look at those two weirdos splashing around in the puddles'. So we have managed a few sun drenched adventures. I like to call them sundrentures.

We admired some very dramatic coastline and pondered over a dead cow on a beach in western Devon, then fed our appetites for tiny cobbled fishing villages and cream teas in Clovelly.

I demonstrated how being bad at tennis probably means you are also going to be bad at table tennis and Will and our new friend Ed demonstrated how boys will be boys by getting all aflutter upon finding full fire extinguishers on an abandoned train.

We got lost on a bike ride on Dartmoor and saw some Dartmoor ponies. I drank any kind of mulled beverage I came across (it's cold here, okay).

We outwitted the floods and managed to find our way down to Cornwall when most of the public transport demonstrated how pathetically unable to deal with water it is, and stayed in  a shack that will probably be in the sea in 10 years (this is no exaggeration- cliff-edge houses have been toppling over at an alarming rate recently). And the next day we had poached eggs for breakfast, a cider and a wander around the blue and white houses and smuggler's coves of Polperro for lunch and got a wee bit lost looking for a coastal path (after sitting in the growing dark and cold for 3 hours, waiting for a lift that was not coming, we were saved a 6 mile walk in the dark by the kindness of strangers- a lady who, according to her fam who were all bundled in the car, liked to 'collect' the lost and hungry looking).

We walked 5 miles on an internet pilgrimage and then had to walk home in the rain (luckily we had pre-rewarded ourselves with a pint before we left town).

And on those days when going outside was vetoed by a look out the window, a look at each other and a weary sigh into a cup of tea, we did other things. Like learn to knit. I am almost the proud owner of a completely boyfriend knitted, extremely warm and cosy looking scarf. And visit the smallest cinema I ever did see to watch about the muted horrors of Irish catholicism. And cook cinnamon buns and go shopping for hiking boots and visit a marble museum.

And in a wonderfully satisfying circle, we then went back to Halberton and Hugh, Lindsay and Jess, who were the very first stop on our Devsplorations. We spent our last day in Devon watching incredibly posh people on huge horses mingle with archetypal English farmers in wellies and those hats before charging off down the road with their hounds, wandering through a wintry forest next to a murky river, clambering halfway up a hill in the mist on Exmoor (and running back down it when that mist turned to rain) and trying to find somewhere that would give us lunch after 2.30pm in small-town Devon on a winter's afternoon.

Take-away pork pie anyone?

P.S. here are some pictures from last blog. enjoy.

This Kombi sells excellent coffee. This is my favourite thing ever. 

Exeter. We spent many a rainy day here shopping. This day we spent watching swans preen.

A country manor. We have delusions of grandeur.

The beautiful Devon at sunset.

What this? It's only the most famous stone circle of all time.

We did a spot of time travel whilst in Bath.

Some of John Wood's architecture.

some moor pictures (and some others too)

As well as farmers, moors and rain, this is what else is you can find in Devon...

It's always a good time when you're learning to slack-line.

The drama of the west coast...we also saw a dead cow on this beach.

The tiniest fishing village that ever there was. Clovelly. 

Polperro! And the ubiquitous blue and white. 

Polperro makes us smile. 

Smugglers coves in Cornwall...Famous Five style. 

Say hello to Mr. December. 

Oh, the charm. 

The colours of a Devon winter.

Where ever you are, it's always appropriate to yoyo.

King.

Sunset at Hound Tor (a tor is a hill with a pile of rocks on top, to be found all over Dartmoor).

Will's bit on the side...of eggs. 

Sideways Will and pony. 

We went to the marble museum and this is what we found...

"Sound the trumpets Nigel, it's time to drink tea and hunt stuff."

Lucky penny tree. 

Running around Exmoor...in a minute it will start chucking it down. 

Exmoor in the mist.