CORNWALL

We continued west over the Tamar River on the Torpoint chain ferry into Cornwall, 

stopping first at Lostwithiel, 

and spent some time with friends Gayle and Vince at St. Austell, including a lovely visit to Fowey, a beautiful river estuary where I have sailed to many years ago. 

There we had to enjoy a Cornish Cream Tea now that Anita has discovered clotted cream.

Thanks to Gayle posting a photo in Facebook and tagging Anita her friend from the past Lena contacted us. We did not know she had just moved to Cornwall and we were able to meet up with her for a few hours before returning to Plymouth.

Again David hosted us and we took a trip out to Rame Head, 

Looe 

and Polperro with him. 

We stopped for lunch with a lovely lady artist, known as George.

Finally we went out for more live music at the Barbican Theatre in Plymouth where the Cabarats band  were playing their lively style of Balkan influenced music. They really had us dancing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZvVH6ZU1DY

It was time to drive back to Sidmouth and take Mother to the Golden Lion at Tipton St. John where we enjoyed scampi and chips and a home-made dessert. Mine was a delicious traditional British treacle tart with custard.

The final night in Bournemouth at the Royal Bath Spa Hotel was a disappointment. We paid a higher price to be able to be there for a relaxing sauna evening, but it did not materialise as the spa closed early at weekends, we had to pay 10 GB Pounds to park over night to Bournemouth Council in a car park, and the hotel wanted another 10 GB Pounds to use the sauna. There was not time to enjoy it, nor did we expect to be asked to pay extra (read the small print !!). We should have stayed somewhere different. There is street parking but only free from 9 pm to 8 am.

We dropped the rental car off at Bournemouth airport the following morning. Weather was cold and damp and we were happy to be heading south again.

DEVON and LIVE MUSIC, ENGLAND

From Poland we took a flight to Bournemouth, England and rented a car with the intention to visit my Mother. 24 hours before we travelled the South West of England experienced some heavy snow and some major roads were closed. We drove past many areas with snow at the side of the road towards Exeter, and were only concerned that our remote night stop on high ground would be inaccessible.

Fortunately  we could navigate the narrow lanes with high hedges, a typical feature of the Devon countryside and checked in at about 9 pm. The car park was ice. Through booking.com we chose at a discounted price the Lord Haldon Country Hotel at Dunchideok. We made a room only booking. It was a charming old wing of a former manor house.

We checked out next morning seeing the snow covered landscape under clear blue sky and drove to Sidmouth for our first meeting with Mother and a lovely lunch looking to the sea.

Later we drove on to Plymouth to spend a night with musician friend David after a few minutes on the pebble beach of Budleigh Salterton, 

and in one of the charity shops. 

We spoke about making some music in the evening, David guitar, djembas and singing but instead we went to the Bread and Roses pub to see his friends’ band performing, and we even danced.