We had been counting down the days ( number of sleeps in Georgina's case) until we left old Blightly for the shores of Holland for a holiday with our lovely friends Lyzzy Dee , Tom, Carl & Beth.
We (I) did all of the packing ( as all Malc packed was his own under pants !) got the car ready and left home very early on 7th August bound for Dover. It was a non eventful couple of hours in the car with several text messages shared between Lyzzy and I as to our progress on the good old M25 motorway.
When our co travellers arrived we were delighted to find out that Carl had entered into the holiday spirit and had dyed his hair a beautiful white blond colour to match Malc's quickly shrinking locks of tamarind monkey shade.
We drove onto the ferry and found some very comfortable seats in which to eat our home made breakfast/ brunch picnics.
The last time that I had been on a boat was to a tiny place called Lundy island just off the coast of Devon, I have never been so ill in all of my life and was still being ill when the boat had stopped. It was a really rough crossing and I would have possibly sold my family in order to take the option of paying for the helicopter flight back to the main land on the return trip!
Luckily for everyone crossing the channel was very smooth and with no helicopter in sight and only a short sail - we seemed to arrive very quickly.
As we entered France we relied on "Stella sat Nav" ( belonging to Lyzzy dee and Tom ) and Malc's hand written notes on how to get to Holland. He had laid a huge map out on the kitchen table and planned his route with a variety of road numbers scribbled down on a scrap of paper which I lovingly stuffed into the glove box of the car.
Stella had an interesting way of changing her mind at the last moment - our most memorable part of driving through France was a split second driving manoeuvre from Tom into a right hand lane off the carriageway which we had to follow or find ourselves in Belgium !!
Tom earned himself the nickname of " Right turn Clyde" from that moment on.
We stopped eventually for a break having tried to get Tom to stop for 50 miles by flashing our headlights !! ( Love you really Tom ! x) After this we remembered that we had in fact brought some walky talkies with us - somewhere in the boot of the car - they proved to be really handy as we had one in "Tracy" our car and Lyzzy and Tom had one in "Ruby", their car.
We finally arrived at the camp site and started to unpack our stuff into our caravan. Lyzzy and Tom unfortunately had a problem with their accomodation but luckily this rectified and they had the caravan next door to us.
Next door to the camp site was a theme park which the kids loved.Some of the rides scared the hell out of me. Georgie, Sam and Beth decided that they would go onto a chair ride- a nice gentle ride I thought. The next moment our children were being swung 40 feet in the air on a chair with only a chain holding them in ! They loved every moment of it and wanted to go on again !!
We've never really been camping before so staying in a caravan was a new experience for us as a family, but one that we actually enjoyed.
The vans were quite well equipped and very cosy. We had a large area of grass in front which became our badminton court and the kids play area.
There seemed to be a lot of different birds in the area from seagulls , crows and sparrow type creatures. There was also a tiny wild cat living in a hedge nearby which the children tried to entice out and every evening a group of ducks walked past our window.
The caravan opposite our one was inhabited by a rather strange family. Each of the caravans had a small bathroom area with toilet, shower and hand basin. There was one window in each room covered by a roller blind as the glass in the window was not opaque or made of readily obcurred glass and if you stood in front of the window you could be easily seen by all and sundry.
This did not seem to worry our neighbours in the slightest and became a source of our childish amusement but also of annoyance.
The neighbours would not put their blind down in their bathroom which meant that every time they went to the loo - we could see them, as their window was situated next to their toilet and opposite our decking area.
This usually happened when I was eating !!
It became a bit of a joke as one morning we had the whole family go to the loo whilst we were eating our breakfast on the veranda outside. The bald headed strange male member of the family, must have held the Guiness world record for the length of time he spent on the loo and in fact we held a sweep stake for the number of wipes - we think that Lyzzy dee won and so made her a suitable award as a prize out of loo roll of course.
We dropped loud hints but these people did not seem to care - so an evil plan was hatched one night ( Tom - I blame you!).
We decided to " bread the roof of their caravan ". Now for those of you who do not have a mean streak or evil sense of humour and retribution - this is how it works..
Find some old bread or even stale cake will do and in the dead of night , usually after having consumed a proportion of alcohol, break the bread into small to middling size pieces and throw them on the roof of a caravan especially one with a corrugated echoey roof.
You will then find at approximately 0300 hours in the morning, or possibly earlier, there will be the pitter patter of huge great stonking seagull feet and every visiting bird from nests from miles around will land on the roof and eat the bread attached thereon and therefore give the occupants a rather disturbed sleep.
I know that this is an extremely dreadful thing to do and I apologise for my unkind act to my fellow man.
As a good catholic girl I should know better - and to do it every single night of your holiday is a shameful thing - but brilliant fun and a great way of getting your own back !!!!!
One night Malc ran round to Lyzzy and Tom's , as we think that they "breaded our roof one night!" to return the favour.
He stood at the back of their caravan throwing up lumps of stale cake onto their roof - only to be caught doing so by the people in the caravan at the back of them - try explaining that one !!
Well, now that one confession is out in the open - will share a bit more later !
3 comments:
Deb, I had no idea that you had taken so many 'useful photographs' !!We had a brilliant holiday, the kids were excellent, the badminton court was a little rough and the quality of your feathery cocks was suspect. I had no idea you had caught the strange man in action!!! I have told everyone at work that Sven managed to lose Tracey in Brugges!!!
Sounds like a really fun holiday. How nice to travel with good friends. I never heard of the bread on the roof thing. Around here you throw toilet paper all over someone's house and yard. It's called TP'ing.
Linda
The bread and stale cake on the roof for the birds is great! That is such a harmless thing. I must remember it for later.
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