Re: Mick's Motoring South Coast Saunter

[NewcastleFalcon]

While much amusement has already been extracted from Mick's excellent video and choice of musical accompaniment, at the risk of telling you what you already know, you may like to try it with the playback speed setting at 2.

Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

I believe you two chaps drove past the Belle Tout Lighthouse an old favourite from the archive pages of the FCF.

And the whole lighthouse is mobile !

Neil

[CitroJim]

I believe you two chaps drove past the Belle Tout Lighthouse an old favourite from the archive pages of the FCF.

We did and I was busy contemplating how magical it would have been to have been near there at the weekend to run the Beachy Head marathon

Maybe just as well I didn't as it was a very wet and rainy one this year...

[bobins]

I was born and raised nary a mile or so from that lighthouse

[mickthemaverick]

At last I have a fully functional laptop, my interim one having given up one day after creating it!! So now equipped with a new machine, to me that is, and Windows 11, which I am getting used to but not keen on so far, I can actually set about the tale of the South Coast Saunter:

Jim arrived at Maverick Manor at 06.10 am on Thursday 19th and we transferred his luggage to the Legacy ready for our planned 6.30 departure. In fact we left just before 6.20 as the rain had begun to fall. By 6.45 we were on a dry and fast flowing M25 heading for the Dartford Crossing. The original plan had been to use the Woolwich Ferry but the only time constraint of the entire Saunter applied on that first day, although Jim didn't know it at the time!

Day 1 route took us down to the M20 and along and up the A299 to Mickey's Diner,

Breakfast stop

it had to be done, where we had a decent breakfast after Jim had taken the pics of his favourite pink car in the car park! After that we meandered along the North Kent coast to visit Bro-ad-St Aires as mum used to call it when relating the family holiday story to our posh neighbours!!

A nice tower in Chatham

The bridge to The Isle of Sheppey

A tunnel that appealed!

Bleak House of a certain novelist's fame!

On leaving there we set off south towards Hythe and our only time restriction travelling down through Dover

Dover harbour approach

The seafront and cliffs

until we arrived in Hythe with time to spare to catch the 12.30 to Dungeness on the RHDR for lunch.

Hythe Station cafe

Amazing how pleasing an Eccles Cake can be!

We caught the train and the cameras got to work:

Our loco

Its drive chain

A working signal box

The sun had joined us during the morning

We got to Dungeness and devoured our lunch in the cafe to give us time for a walk round before the return journey to Hythe. I found myself combining the local information board with a bit of shadow art:

Romney Marsh Information

and then had to cover the local pub in the amazing clear light:

A lovely sky

Shadow strikes

On the ride back to Hythe I kept the camera in my pocket to just enjoy the experience.

After disembarking we set off across the marsh to Hastings for our first overnight stop where we found an excellent hotel in a slightly grim part of St Leonards. I was very happy with the room and its facilities as I believe Jim was with his.:

My first night's room

My first night's room

My first night's room

My first night's room

My first night's room

We unpacked and went in search of a pub for dinner which was duly consumed and washed down nicely with Guinness for me and low alcohol beer for Jim, he decided to give it a try!!

In view of the photo restrictions per post I'll call it a day there and resume with Day 2 later or tomorrow!!

[NewcastleFalcon]

Picking up on the Charles Dickens reference at Broadstairs Mick, I also picked up on the your subsequent photo of approaching Dover Harbour and the similarities to some photo's I took yesterday and lobbed it up on POTD under the title "A Tale of Two Harbours...."

viewtopic.php?p=774636#p774636

Neil

[mickthemaverick]

I woke up quite early on Friday morning, no doubt Jim had already been for a run, and washed and dressed ready for breakfast. I always pack my bags before breakfast so I don't have to return to my room afterwards, and hence with everything done I took them down to the car and then went to find Jim in the dining room. Breakfast was a very tasty Full English and we both partook to our limits!!

The day's itinerary involved working our way along the south coast with a visit to Beachy Head and a run past Southampton docks in the hope of finding some decent ships to photograph. Jim took a number of pictures along the way and has already posted some but here are a few from the route to our lunch stop at Dell Quay:

On route to Beachy Head

On route to Beachy Head

An almost coffee stop between Newhaven and Brighton

Not designed for cricket!

An ice cream halt near Littlehampton

On the way to lunch

On the way to lunch

Dell Quay looking South

Dell Quay looking North

Quay Kitchen garden

The converted

Having devoured an excellent lunch we headed on past Southampton where we found our luck was in:

Cunard rules the waves

And again!

Having satisfied my desire to see a 'Queen' and astounded Jim by the size of one of the, I believe, Carnival Cruise ships in dock, we set off for our planned meet with a chap who had bought Jim's old fishing reel on Ebay. We had agreed to meet him in Poole in the hope that Colin, Admiral51, would have been able to join us for dinner. Unfortunately that wasn't possible so we rearranged to meet the buyer on our route from Poole to Bere Regis where we were staying overnight. Poole's harbour had simply not been viable for parking so it turned out for the best. Having met Scott, the buyer, we drove on to find our apartment in Bere Regis. Along the way we came up behind this C5, anyone recognise it?

A random C5 on the road

Once we arrived at our apartment I experienced the first, and as it turned out only, disappointment of the entire Saunter. Some people may love this apartment but for me it hardly ticked any boxes at all. Judge for yourself:

The hard floored lounge

Jim's room with bed against the wall

Bathroom with wet room shower

Bland kitchen, spot the cutlery drawer!

My room, bed against the wall

Wifi password if you're in Bere Regis!!

Mutually concealing our disappointment we headed to the local pub for dinner. The place was ok and the food was edible but not the standard we had been getting used to. During our chat Jim told me that he would prefer to do the Parkrun in Dorchester rather than the previously planned Bridport. That didn't really make much difference to our morning plan as we intended to go to the Parkrun and then grab some breakfast on the way from there to Peter N's near Charmouth..
With that plan in mind we headed back to the apartment where I watched the F1 qualifying while Jim retired to polish his spikes!! Overall day 2 had been another cracker so bedtime arrived with thoughts of our progress into Cornwall creeping into my mind!!

[CitroJim]

Excellent Loving reading this Mick! Reminding me with every sentence just what a great Saunter it was...

'Polishing my spikes' Sounds a bit dodgy that does In fact, after that slightly below-par meal I went out for a long run to work off all the excess calories, run along every road in Bere Regis, discover everything about it and prepare myself for Dorchester parkrun

The highlight of Bere Regis for me was discovering it has a locality called s**t... Oh how I giggled... Yes, I know, at my age I should be above such things now...

[CitroJim]

The highlight of Bere Regis for me was discovering it has a locality called s**t...

I see the forum naughty word filter has censored the locality name...

It can't sensor a photo though.. Or can it?

[MarcusMcGuinness]

What Jim said. Vicariously enjoying the saunter through your write-up, Mick, and your photos and those that Jim took. Looking forward to the Dorset-Devon leg. Love that coast!

Mac

[mickthemaverick]

Day 3 dawned quite bright but with some scattered clouds with a foreboding appearance. I got up at seven and prepped myself for the day ahead. Jim had been out for a pre parkrun tune up and was raring to go so we set off for Dorchester and the event venue. My role was simply to sit in the car and listen to the F1 chat while Jim got on with the serious business:

The gathering in the rain from the car

The gathering mob

Warming up in the dry

A possible refuge for me

The man himself in action

Having ventured to the refuge it was good to realise the rain had stopped so I took the opportunity to make episode 2 of my yet to develop series 'The Enthusiasm of the Long Distance Looney'
I posted it earlier in the thread to tease you but it needs to be repeated here for the benefit of late joiners:



Once the run was over it was time to find some breakfast on the way to Peter's so we set off along the road to Abbotsbury to join the coastal route to Bridport in the hope of finding a breakfast place to charge our batteries.

Having gone through Bridport with no luck we joined the A35 towards Charmouth and almost immediately saw a Cafe signposted. We dived down there and parked up to find an overgrown caravan/container with a serving hatch. We ordered breakfast rolls and coffee and stood back to await their preparation. I could hear the infamous sound of the coast and looked round for the source which soon became apparent:

A youngster patiently waiting to hoover up our scraps!

During my search for that source I realised that the 'container' actually had an indoor seating part on the side and we could have gone in and ordered a plated breakfast ! It turned out to be fortunate I had seen it as the next shower suddenly unleashed itself upon us so we dived inside, told the young lady where we were and promptly got served in there instead of the outside picnic tables!!

Breakfast tucked away and we set off to meet Peter. Unfortunately we were approaching from the opposite direction to the one I used on my last visit to Peter and as a result I missed an important turning and could not remember the route. So I pulled up in Charmouth high street and phoned Peter for directions which put us on the right road and then I recognised it and got up his access road with no more difficulties. I was thankful for the 4WD though as it was very muddy and made for an entertaining climb!! Sadly, due to the delays we had around Parkrun and breakfast we were only able to stay at Peter's for a short while but an extremely enjoyable time it was!! Thanks Peter and Sylvie!! (Hope I've got that right )

Leaving Peter's we continued our route along the coast taking the A3052 through Lyme Regis and on to Sidmouth. We passed this monument which Jim managed to get a few shots of:

Mystery Monument

Mystery Monument closer

Mystery Monument closest

At one point we were delighted to come across this excellent obstruction:

A blockage ahead?

Forgiven!

Arriving in Sidmouth we captured the high street and the seafront:

Sidmouth High Street

and again

The seafront

A nice looking hotel

Holiday flats I believe1

Leaving Sidmouth we made an executive decision. As the weather was looking iffy, and we were already running late, we decided that we would have to omit some of the planned route in order to get to our evening halt in St Austell in reasonable time for Jim to have a warm down run before dinner. So I ruthlessly replotted the route bypassing Budleigh Salterton and Exmouth by following the A3052 into Exeter where we joined the A30/A38 to head down into Cornwall.

The weather was not being good at this point so we decided to give Torbay a miss as well and head down to Launceston area where we could cut across to rejoin our planned route just west of Saltash. This diversion did mean missing crossing Saltash bridge but it also meant avoiding the Plymouth traffic.

Eventually we arrived at a layby a couple of miles north of St Austell where we programmed in the overnight hotel's address to the in car nav to find the hotel. Hmmmm!!! There followed an unexpected but very pleasant ride through St Austell and down to Mevagissey for a trip round the harbour!! Delightful but not exactly what I was expecting, knowing the hotel to be in St Austell!! So I re-entered the address and tried again, this time it took us into St Austell to a parking place 20 metres from the hotel door. I still don't know what went wrong there! However we did arrive in time for Jim to have a quick run round while I caught up with the F1.

Down to the dining room for dinner which is where I will pick this up in the next instalment!

[CitroJim]

Magic And yes, Mevagissey was a delightful diversion and we got to see it twice - bonus!

[NewcastleFalcon]

Here is a question for the "Saunterers" first one to answer gets 60 points.

The Relevant Paragraph

Leaving Sidmouth we made an executive decision. As the weather was looking iffy, and we were already running late, we decided that we would have to omit some of the planned route in order to get to our evening halt in St Austell in reasonable time for Jim to have a warm down run before dinner. So I ruthlessly replotted the route bypassing Budleigh Salterton and Exmouth by following the A3052 into Exeter where we joined the A30/A38 to head down into Cornwall

What possible significance does the A3052 have in the pages of the FCF

A simple visual clue to help...not much thinking required...click to enlarge to make the answer more obvious...
One to add to the Seaton Sluice Sewer Gas Lamps list...

Neil

[mickthemaverick]

Might that be the road through Colyton with the old Shell pumped garage?

[NewcastleFalcon]

Might that be the road through Colyton with the old Shell pumped garage?

No the answer is in plain sight if you enlarge the picture and look at the nearside...

Neil