Synopsis: Time spent with Helen over the Christmas holidays. Days of leisure mixed with days of activity. Includes night cycle ride to Exmouth and time on the family history trail in South Wales.
(selection of photos from Flickr photo set – use link above to view album)
I picked up a picnic supper for Helen and myself in Tesco before setting off for Heathrow to pick up Helen. Arrived at Reading Moto Services about 1 hr 30 mins too early. We Skyped briefly. It was only a matter of minutes before Helen was boarding. Checking BA Flight Status web pages, I could see the flight departed 7 minutes early. I wiled away a little more time before setting off for Heathrow Terminal 5. I arrived 13 minutes after touch-down. I didn't have to wait long before Helen appeared, from the wrong door. Or, was I looking at the other door?
I tried to dispel any fears Helen might have that I wasn’t prepared for her visit. Major work was taking place in my house to get some heating and hot water installed. A few weeks previous my heating failed completely, and with Christmas fast approaching, things did look desperate. This photo shows the bedroom my daughters use on their visits, and as can be seen, it was far from ready a couple of days ago. Thankfully my plumber and I got the bedroom fit for Helen’s visit. However, at the time of our journey home from Heathrow, Helen and I didn’t know whether any heat was available in my house. Laura's comment did make me smile - she was panicking on her sister's behalf.
We experienced some patchy heavy rain on the journey back to Exeter. We didn't stop, just snacked as we went. This meant that we made good time and arrived back home around midnight. There was a note from my plumber to tell me that he hadn't had enough time to install the timer/thermostatic heating control, which meant we'd arrived home to a cool home. My plumber said he'd be back at 9 am the following morning.
We had planned to have a full English breakfast at The Imperial, but this had to be postponed due to the fact that my plumber was expected to appear to finish installation of my heating system. Instead we had a traditional Daddy breakfast at home.
My plumber turned up on time and immediately set to work. He installed the receiver next to the boiler, which wasn't my first choice, but time was of the essence. First attempt at connecting the Hive Active Heating system resulted in all boxes showing that they were connected, but the boiler failing to fire-up. An alternative wiring arrangement was implemented and, to our relief, on the second attempt the Hive Active Heating system came up working and the boiler began pumping hot water. That was the plumber's work done, so we wished each other a Happy Christmas and the plumber went on his way.
Helen and I set about quickly establishing a heating schedule, which we found easy to do. We then grabbed our swimming things and headed to town. Our plan was to go for a swim, and then have a picnic in town, followed by a little shopping.
As is typical, in my experience, the Riverside Leisure Centre was very quiet this Christmas Eve. We had a really enjoyable swim. Then we walked back to the car where we dropped off our swimming gear and picked up our picnic lunch. We made our way across to Southernhay, where there are numerous benches, and here we sat to eat our lunch.
We then made for the top end of town where we sought out a running shop. I was in need of new running shoes. Helen, Can, Laura and Uwe had clubbed together and given me Birthday/Christmas money so that I might get myself some new shoes. The shoes that I have been running in are more than 20 years old. They had definitely seen better day. In the running shop I was photographed and videoed on the treadmill, to form a picture of my running style. As it happens I have a very neutral style, not requiring remedial measures. After trying on several shoes, finally I found the pair for me.
Helen and I discovered that the Christmas Market had unfortunately, although not entirely unexpectedly, moved on. We opted for Marks Spencer food hall as our next stop, to search out something to take along with us in the evening. We'd been invited to a family gathering at my brother's home. We found some nice chocolate and caramel sponge rolls which were just the thing. We then set off for home.
At my brother's home, where we had been invited to an evening of 'mulled wine and nibbles', we all gathered that evening. It was a good kick-off to Christmas. As they live only a five minute walk from my home, it was all rather convenient too.
It wasn't a late evening. Helen and I arrived home just after 9 pm. As we weren't tired, we said we'd watch something. I had toyed with the idea of opening an Amazon Prime account for the holiday period, and that's what I did. Then came the decision as to what to watch. We plumped, on Helen’s recommendation, for a programme from the first series of Sherlock Holmes staring Benedict Cumberbatch. It was actually a lot of fun. It is very well acted, and there was a good rapport between the two lead actors.
Helen and I decided that the first thing that we'd do after our breakfast was the preparations for our midday meal. We were planning to cook duck in orange sauce. We set the duck to one side on a roasting dish and prepared all the vegetables.
You’ll note the prevalence of my fifties style kitchen. Very appropriate, don’t you think? for the fifties born man working in it. It has been known to have its detractors, but I rather like it. It’s all just a matter of what you get used to.
Next job was opening the presents. There was only the two of us, but we had a number of presents to open. Helen had wrapped my running shoes and a pair of socks she'd bought me to go with them. I'm extremely pleased with these shoes and hope to give them a trial run sometime soon. For Helen, I gave her hiking socks, a computer mouse and a set of bicycle lights. The last of these, the bicycle lights, were a last minute idea of mine. I thought it would be nice to cycle to Exmouth in the dark. To do this, Helen needed some lights for her bike. She told me she had no lights back home in Germany, and that she was extremely glad of them.
By now lunch was slowly cooking away in the background and smells were wafting into the living room from the kitchen. We grilled some sausages and bacon. And Helen made an orange sauce. The whole meal turned out perfectly. I opened a bottle of Prosecco to wash it all down. Complete with crackers, this was the perfect Christmas lunch.
We'd both eaten too much for pudding. We therefore decided to postpone the Christmas pudding and clotted cream until tea time. The weather was rather damp and dismal out, so we decided we'd like to sit down and watch another Sherlock Holmes TV programme from series 1. This transpired to be very much our theme for this Christmas.
Then, later in the day, as evening came on, we thought it would be nice to put a film on. We browsed Amazon Prime and came upon The Imitation Game. We decided to give it a go. I did warn Helen that ultimately it was a sad story. But, on watching it, we were both agreed it was extremely well done. Cumberbatch puts in a real tour de force performance.
And that concluded our quiet, but exceedingly successful and enjoyable Christmas Day. The Cadbury's Roses were somewhat depleted (I blame Helen), but it had been a great time.
We both felt that some fresh air and exercise would do us both good. I suggested we put our bikes on the car and we take them down to Exmouth. Helen, perhaps a little reluctantly, agreed that sounded good. Helen had reservations about this because it was blowing a gale and she feared she would get cold. She decided to put on an extra layer, and that was probably a good idea.
This was the first time that I had driven the new Kingskerswell Bypass. This major road scheme does make the journey to Torquay so much easier and quicker. The idea came to me to park in the grounds of Oldway Mansion if that were possible, and there was no indication that we couldn't. We soon had the bicycles offloaded and were ready to set out on our ride.
We made our way through the grounds of Oldway Mansion, and then crossed the road, and cycled through Victoria Park. Cutting across Paignton, we then followed the railway for a while, leading us into Goodrington. We cycled the length of the seafront, and that was to be our furthest most point in that direction. Turning about, we cycled towards the rock walk of Goodrington, a series of meandering paths that wind their way up a cliff face. From the top there were nice views out to Berry Head.
We then dropped down into Paignton, circling the harbour briefly, before picking up the road that runs the length of the seafront. It was a busy day, and there were lots of people about. It was evidently the day to be walking/cycling off the excesses of Christmas Day.
I pointed out to Helen a beach which could be sheltered from the strong winds, at which we might stop to eat our lunch. The beach was that at Hollacombe. It was actually quite difficult to get down onto the sand, and there was probably better shelter to be found just back from the beach anyway, so we settled upon a wall to eat our picnic lunch. I put the kettle on to brew us a cup of tea.
After lunch I set about mending a puncture I'd acquired just as we approached Hollacombe Beach. It didn't take me long to swap the punctured inner tube for a new one. We were then on our way once again. It wasn't long before Torquay came into sight. We cycled the length of the sea front, travelling as far as the furthest breakwater. From the end of the breakwater the wind was really fierce, so we didn't stay long.
On our return we detoured up into Cockington Manor. We cycled all the way up to the manor house. Then we circled around the property to look at the craft shops around the back of the manor house, but found all of these to be closed. Making our way over to the church, I suggested Helen peek her head in, which she did. She said it looked lovely, decorated for Christmas. I too took a couple of minutes out to take a quick look around.
Heading away from the manor house, we followed a path that took us down past the run of lakes. Then, back in Cockington Lane once again, we followed this back to the sea front. We cycled on as far as Paignton Pier, and then cut in to Victoria Park, and on further to Oldway Mansion.
That evening we arranged with Mum to pop around. We picked up a chicken and pasta bake from my place, and took this around to Mum's, which we ate with peas. We followed this with mince pies and clotted cream. It was a sumptuous meal, and Helen and I had a ravishing appetite for some reason.
I'd bought Mum a Google Chromecast for Christmas, and suggested we try it out. I plugged it into Mum's television and set it up. I discovered we were entitled to watch one free film on Google Play. I looked for films and discovered The One Hundred Foot Journey, a film I'd previously noted as being 'Nanny friendly' was available. I selected the HD version of this film (£3.49/rent), and streamed this to Mum's television. It was a lovely film, all about the delights of making food, and the rivalries that exist between two competing restaurants. Perfect Christmas fodder. Finally, at the end of the evening, Helen and I set off on foot for home. It had been a very satisfying day.
Cycle Statistics:
Total Distance: 24.1 km / 15.0 miles
Elapsed Time: 3hrs 14min
Total Ascent: 373 metres
Buses: (none)
Drove to Oldway Mansion where we parked our car for cycle start/finish
Helen and I cycled over to Tesco to do a quick shop. Helen planned to cook a curry for Grandma, who she was visiting today. I had a few odd jobs to do around the house before having a quick snack lunch. I then cycled to Halfords to pick up a new inner tube (I had a puncture on Saturday!). I picked up a few supplementary things in Tesco, and then returned home.
Helen cycled down to her grandma's, where she also met up with her Uncle Peter. She cooked lunch as planned, although Peter settled for a sandwich, as apparently he doesn't like spicy food. Then Peter drove them down to Exmouth for a brief stroll along the seafront.
We had a bangers and mash supper that evening, which was really nice. Sometimes plain simple food like that can be just the ticket. We washed it down with what was left of the Prosecco from Christmas Day.
In the evening we sat down to watch the last programme from the Sherlock Holmes series 1. This has a cliff-hanger of an ending, with Moriarty threatening Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson. We will have to wait to view series 2 to see what becomes of them.
We rang Christine in the morning and asked them if they would like to play badminton and then to watch the film Star Wars. They were interested in playing badminton, but not Star Wars. I booked a couple of badminton courts at Riverside Leisure Centre for 11 am. We drove down and met up in the leisure centre car park.
As usual, the badminton was quite competitive. It was fun to play, and everyone enjoyed themselves. It was incredibly quiet. There was just one other couple playing on another court. I had noticed that for the whole of today, there were only 3 1-hour court sessions booked, not many considering they have six courts.
After having played badminton, we discussed where next. I suggested the Malt House, a Harvester pub, just across the road. As this had a customer car park, we were all agreed that would make a convenient place to lunch. The meals were just right, plentiful and tasty. And the puddings were something else. Certainly no complaints there. And the service was excellent too; the staff even split our bill for us, that made things easy.
We were keen to walk off our meal, so we parked on-street nearby, and did a quick circuit along the river and back to the quay. We then returned to our respective cars, and set off for home. Helen and I stopped and had a look around Range. I was looking for garden shoes, but couldn't find any. Helen did manage to find 500 stickers for £1, to use in her teaching.
We then returned home where we dropped our badminton kits off and picked up some snack food for our supper. Just crackers and cheese, as we really weren't going to be all that hungry. We also picked up a couple of games to play, Taboo and Brain Busters. Oh, and a bottle of wine of course.
After Helen, Mum and I had snacked, we briefly watched a YouTube video of Dick van Dyke's 90th birthday, that took place a few weeks previously. He is certainly sprightly for a 90-year old. People were Flash Mob dancing to the old songs that Dick Van Dyke had made so very famous, and he looked on from a balcony. We also showed Mum how to play music CDs on her TV sound system. Mum had been given ‘A Year of Songs’ by Alexander Armstrong for Christmas.
We then played Taboo for a while. It was a lot of fun. And David also showed us briefly how he could Google Chromecast from the Show Box movie site (free) from his Android phone. Christine provided Helen with some web site addresses of companies that provide educational material for her school.
Helen had some teaching administration to do in the morning, so we remained at home until after lunch. I used the time to search out a new mobile phone for Mum, and placed an order for this on the Tesco web site. We then had a quick curry ready-meal lunch with nan bread.
By early afternoon we were ready for our cycle ride. My intention was a night cycle ride, and my initial plan was for us to cycle to Exmouth in the dark and catch the train home. But the weather was really nice, and the forecast was that it would deteriorate later, so Helen suggested we cycle both ways, and set off after lunch. This seemed an excellent plan. Helen fitted her new cycle lights to her bicycle (Christmas present), and we set off.
There was a little bit of a headwind on our way to Exmouth, but we made good time, despite my having another puncture, and having to fit a new inner tube. It took us just one hour and 20 minutes to reach Exmouth seafront.
We cycled the length of the seafront as far as Orcombe Point. Exmouth was really busy with visitors. A little fine weather, even in December, and this is one of the favourite places to be. The cycling long the seafront wasn't altogether as easy as it might have been, as much of the sand from the beach had been deposited on the path which forms the cycleway. Helen and I often found ourselves skidding all over the place.
We had some slightly stale muffins (leftover from our Heathrow journey) which we ate in one of the shelters. Then we went into the new Beachcomber complex, the Ocean Café), where we ordered coffees. We sat in the large window and watched the light gradually fading and the decorative electric lights come on. We took this as our cue to be on our way.
It was dimpsey, but not dark, as we cycled out of Exmouth. The Christmas lights were on in the Strand, which was nice. Helen's bright new front cycle light soon came in useful as we left the outer regions of Exmouth. It has a strong beam of light, which lit the otherwise dark trail. I cycled in Helen's light, so that I could see where I was going.
The evening was warm and the following wind a great help. We whizzed along, in part guided by the trail marker lights embedded in the track, a new acquisition on the trail. Odd thing is, there remain stretches where these marker lights have not been fitted. Did the money or time run out? I suspect in time the whole trail will be illuminated in this way. We stopped briefly along the Goat Walk in Topsham to take this photo of a large piece of driftwood, illuminated by Helen’s front bicycle light
On reaching Topsham Helen and I decided that a pint and a packet of crisps would go down well. We sought out the Passage House Inn, a place we've stopped at a number of times when on this trail. It's a lovely traditional English pub, and it serves an excellent range of ales. Apparently Tuesday is quiz night, but that would be later, so we were told we could sit at a 'reserved' table until then.
Helen and I came up with the idea that we'd eat up leftover mash potato in the fridge when we got home, and would pick up some bacon and eggs to go with that as we passed Tesco. What a brilliant idea that was. The perfect meal after a long cycle ride.
In total, we cycle 34 kilometres. This took me to a grand total for the year of 1,984 kilometres (exactly). Just a mere 16 kilometres short of my target for the year, of 2,000 kilometres. Will I make it?
Later that evening we watched the first part of a two-part mini-series of the Frankenstein story. Both Helen and I had read the story by Mary Shelley during the year, and thought it would be nice to sample this adaptation of the story. It proved very faithful to the original story.
Cycle Statistics:
Total Distance: 37.0 km / 23.0 miles
Elapsed Time: 3hrs 45min
Total Ascent: 217 metres
Buses: (none)
We made some sandwiches and set off in the car for Bernaville Nursery. I bought some rubber clogs to wear in the garden. We also bought a plant to give to David and Julie. It was pouring with rain. We ate our picnic lunch in the garden nursery car park watching people dash to-and-fro.
We then drove into town. Helen was keen to take a look at some German language educational books, as she expects to be teaching some German when back in Germany. A demand for this has in part arisen from the Syrian refugee crisis. We also popped into Marks and Spencers to pick up some cakes for pudding at David and Julie's.
Helen and I drove down to David and Julie’s home and arrived mid afternoon. We spent a lot of time talking about family history. I’d done some research into their side of the family so that I could talk about this with my daughters Helen and Laura. David and Julie were interested to know what I’d found. They in turn shared with us information about their German ancestry, and showed us some old family photos. German ancestral names possibly hint at a Jewish background (Grichisch, Kappel, Zwaller and Janisch).
On their side of the family there is a good deal of Welsh and Irish blood. On my side of the family, we have English and Scottish blood. So, all in all, Helen and Laura can say they have a pretty good mix from the gene pool. Helen and I explained that we would be travelling to Wales next week (see below) on the family history trail. In particular, the we wished to see the stained glass window of St Helen dedicated to Helen’s great-great-great grandmother, Ellen Coughlin (née O’Brien). I’ve filed notes of our discussions for private viewing under Julie in my OneDrive Family History folder.
Helen and I felt that Mum would appreciate a trip out, so we thought we'd drive out to Knightshayes (NT) together. On arrival at Knightshayes car park we discovered it was quite full, so this was evidently a popular destination today. We arrived around midday, and a little hungry, so we purchased our entry ticket and then made our way to the Stables restaurant. We ordered a mix of baked potatoes and a pork bap for lunch. This provided the sustenance we needed for the trek around Knightshayes house.
We'd noticed the daffodils were in flower as we approached the house, quite amazing for the time of year. I just had to take a photograph of them. We entered the house via the Smoking Room. From here we entered the enormous main hall, obviously designed to impress, and that it did.
The building has a wonderful Gothic romantic quality to it. It is sort of Victorian medieval, if you know what I mean. Parts of the building were decorated for Christmas, which added to the atmosphere. We watched a short (8 minute) video which explains something of the history of the building.
A lovely snow scene had been created on the billiard table. And on the wall of the Billiard Room we came across a poem about the seven deadly sins. These sins are mirrored in the sculpture corbels of the roof.
After our visit to Knightshayes we set off back towards Exeter. We wanted to pop into Tesco to pick up the new smartphone I’d ordered for Mum. We also needed to pick up what we needed for our raclette meal planned for later that evening.
We had decided to eat at Mum's, since she is most comfortable there. If Mum didn't wish to stay up to see the New Year in, then she would have the option of going to bed early. Helen and I set about preparing the raclette meal on reaching Mum's. We had everything ready by 18:00, but no one showed until 19:45. We made use of this time by beginning to configure Mum's new smartphone. I also redeemed the £20.00 Google Play credit that we received with the Google Chromecast purchase.
Wendy and Colin arrived a little later, although they had already eaten. After supper we sat around chatting for a while. We saw in the new year watching the fireworks in London on the television. I popped the cork on a bottle of sparkling white wine with which we all toasted the new year. The fireworks, and the choreography with the music, was quite amazing. Around 00:30 we all collected our things to make our individual ways home. Mum had somehow made it through to the bitter end.
It was a frosty night, and Colin had to scrape ice from his car. Rather an unusual occurrence this winter. Helen and I made our way home, searching the sky for Orion. Helen is so much better than I am at spotting the constellations. It had been a very nice evening.
Helen planned to spend time with her Grandma today. She intended to cook her a risotto using some of the leftover food from the previous night's raclette supper at Mum's. Helen was going to cycle down to her Grandma's, but the weather was really foul, so I drove her down.
I had a little Internet banking to do in the morning. Then some ironing. And for lunch, I too cooked myself a risotto from food remains from the previous evening's meal. I was just about to set off for Tesco when Helen rang for a lift back home. I arranged to pick up Helen once I'd completed my small shop at Tesco.
Early evening we watched the second and final part of the Frankenstein TV mini-series we'd started watching a few nights previously. This we found to be an excellent and authentic adaptation of the Mary Shelley Novel, that both Helen and I had read last year. It's an excellent story, and this dramatization of the story, although a little wooden, was very engaging (actors: Julie Delpy, Donald Sutherland, Alec Newman, Luke Goss and John Hurt).
We had a Beef Stroganoff ready-meal from Tesco for supper. And followed this with banana and strawberries topped with chocolate and heated in the microwave. Helen did the preparation. It was delicious, but there was almost too much for us to eat.
After supper we watched another episode from the Sherlock television series. We'd watched series 1 previously and tonight the episode we watched was the first from series 2. It was really dramatic and entertaining, possibly the best one we'd so far watched. It was about 'The Woman', as Sherlock describes her. He is obviously quite captivated by her. Helen was suffering with a stiff neck and sat with a hot water bottle against her neck whilst she watched the programme.
On watching the first episode of the Sherlock series a few days previous, I instantly recognised Una Stubbs, someone I hadn't seen in years. I thought it would be amusing to show Helen one of the Till Death Us Do Part comedy television series of the 1960s. We watched a part of 'The TV Licence' programme. Helen thought it was funny. I think she thought I had modelled my life on Alf. Oh dear!
We decided on an early night as we were both very tired.
It was time for some serious exercise. Helen and I decided we'd like to do a run together. This was to be my first outing in my new running shoes, given to me by Helen and Can, Laura and Uwe. The storm clouds cleared and the weather brightened up at 10:00, so off we set. We out to run my regular jog route which is just over 8 kms long. My new running shoes and socks can be seen in this photo which shows all the Christmas presents of Helen and mine.
We set off well, making good time, but then Helen had some stomach cramps, so we paused for a short while. The rest of the run went well, and we completed the circuit in 1hr 2 mins, which was a quick pace, but not my fastest time. I found my new running shoes were excellent, providing so much more bounce when compared with my old shoes. A great present.
Helen jumped immediately in the bath on reaching home, as she was due to meet up with her cousins for lunch. I too took a bath, before making myself a sandwich for lunch. After hanging up the washing in the garage, I set off for Mum's, as I wanted to prepare some operating instructions for Mum's new smartphone. Mum sent her first Whatsapp voice message this afternoon, a message to Helen.
Helen rang me at Mum's to say she'd arrived home. I spent 10 more minutes showing Mum how to use her new mobile phone, before setting off for home. I cooked a salmon in parsley sauce meal for our supper. Then Helen and I spent some time browsing Amazon Prime for movies to watch.
We settled upon the new Great Gatsby by Baz Lurhmann. It was really good. Typical of this director, it was extremely flamboyant and charged in terms of visuals and music. Almost a show rather than film story.
Helen and I tried to sort her new heart rate monitor. This wouldn't connect to her smartphone. In the end we concluded that it simply wasn't compatible. Possibly we will send it back. We turned in at 23:30.
Helen was going to be picked up by her cousin Anna, as Anna's father, Peter, was preparing lunch for them. We had some time to spare in the morning, so Helen and I prepared a package to return her heart beat monitor to Amazon. We had failed to make it work with her mobile phone, so there was little choice but to return it. We were just about to sit down to a cup of coffee when Anna turned up.
I put the washing out on the line and then prepared myself some lunch. I washed a section of the carpet that had been stained by the workings of the plumber who was in the process of fitting a replacement heating system in my house.
I then decided to take an afternoon stroll. I looked in on Mum, as I knew she might have a pair of 3D cinema glasses which she could loan me. I started a stream of Call the Midwife Christmas special, so that Mum could watch this on her new Google Chromecast. Mum had received a Whatsapp message from Laura on her new smartphone. Mum likes to keep abreast of modern technology.
I hadn't returned from my walk very long before Helen arrived home. We cooked an omelette for supper and then sat down to watch another in the Sherlock series. Tonight it was The Hounds of the Baskerville story, set on Dartmoor, much of which we instantly recognised.
Helen travelled to Taunton with Mum, Becky and Sue, to visit Claire. I walked to the Heavitree post office to post the Amazon return parcel (heart beat monitor) that we'd prepared the previous day. I then walked on to the leisure centre for a swim.
Following my swim I walked into town to have a picnic lunch. I then popped to the library to see if they had a map of south Wales, but they didn't. I then did a small Tesco shop in town, primarily purchasing things to take with us on our trip to south Wales which Helen and I set off on tomorrow.
We cooked steak and ale pie in the evening, finishing off some potatoes left over from the raclette meal we'd prepared last week. In the evening Helen and I sat down to watch a DVD version of Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas. This I'd recently purchased for the purpose of putting us in the mood to visit his home at Laugharne, which we hope to do in the coming days.
Helen and I retired relatively early, as we planned to make a reasonably early start on our trip the following day.
We set off from home for Wales at 9:00, as we'd hoped. I popped my rubbish over to Mum on the way, as Helen and I would be away for bin collection later in the week. We made good time and arrived at St Peter's Church, Cardiff, by 11:00, as we had hoped.
Helen and I were a little mystified as to how to enter the church. The two doors that we tried were both locked. We'd been told we could be given access at this time, but not exactly how. A building is attached to the church, and we discovered this had a bell, which we rang. A lady appeared at the door. We explained that we had come to visit the church, and that we had communicated that to a father at the church. The lady said she could let us in. She opened the large iron gate to the presbytery and led us down passageways that connected with the church.
The lady offered to show us around. She told us a little of the history of the church and the parish. I enquired about their crib. She took us to where the crib was. I explained that there was a stained glass window depicting St Helen behind the crib that was dedicated to my daughter Helen's great-great-great grandmother, Ellen Coughlin (née O'Brien). The lady mentioned that she knew O'Brien's in the neighbourhood, and mentioned that there had been an influx of Irish immigrants at the time of the potato famine, which I had presumed was the case for Helen's ancestors.
I took some photos of the stained glass window to St Helen, including a photo of my Helen pointing proudly to the window. Although the window was a little obscured by the crib, the entire window was visible to us, and it was good to at last see it for real.
I think the stained glass window dedicated to Ellen O’Brien makes an emphatic statement about just how religious this family of emigrants from Ireland really were. It perhaps also says something about their wanting to make a mark in this, the country of Wales, which was to be their newly chosen homeland.
Helen and I took some time to wander around St Peter’s Church. It’s a relatively modern church with a sharply pointed high roof. It’s a striking and elegant building which struck me as being rather European in style and not quite what I had expected.
We thanked the lady for showing us around. We then returned to our car and drove on to Cathays Cemetery. We were going to search for the grave of Ellen Coughlin and her husband, but decided that we'd have lunch first. As the weather was a little threatening, we chose to eat our lunch sitting in our car.
After lunch we made our way through the imposing entrance archway of Cathays Cemetery that seems to link to chapels in the grounds of the cemetery. We had picked up a paper map of the cemetery, and used this to find our way to where we knew the grave of Ellen and Andrew Coughlin was to be found.
The gravestone is a simple engraved plinth with a cross on top. The grave is a multiple grave. Ellen Coughlin, whose stained glass window we'd seen in St Peter's Church, along with her husband Andrew Coughlin, are buried there. Also buried at the same location, and dedicated on the gravestone, are siblings of Andrew Coughlin.
After viewing the gravestone, and taking some photos, we headed back across the cemetery to where we had left our car. As we had made good time, we decided to look for a couple of the houses in Cardiff with family connections. I had the addresses of Helen's great grandparents at the time that they married. We set off across Cardiff to see if we could find their homes.
The first address we headed for was 7 Pontcanna Street. Here, we were pleased to find the very house, still standing, but looking empty, with a For Sale notice on it. This was the house of Ernest Isaac Doxsey, Helen's great grandfather.
We then headed for 31 Herbert Street, the address of Helen Mary Summers, Helen's great grandmother. Sadly this house no longer exists. Houses in this street had evidently been cleared, and new flats stood where the house must have once been. The street is adjacent to a railway cutting.
We were still making good time, and I suggested to Helen, we couldn't come this far and not seek out the house in which her grandfather was born. Arthur Edward Howel Doxsey was born at 51 Glebeland Street, Merthyr Tydfil in 1918. We arrived there, and I immediately recognised the house, now an estate agents, from pictures I'd been able to find on Google Street View. I opened the door to the building enquired if this was indeed number 51, and the lady sat inside confirmed it was.
We chatted briefly with this lady, explaining why we had asked. She was genuinely interested in our story, and so we left her with a copy of the family tree we had brought with us. The son of the owner of the estate agents returned to the shop, and he was able to show us old photos of the building, showing us the building when it was a 'Singer' sewing shop. By entering 'old merthyr tydfil' in Google, the first result brought up a link to web pages containing these images.
We took a little time out to walk around Merthyr Tydfil, although we only had a 20 minute stay at our parking spot. We then returned to our car and set off for Llanelli, which was to be our first night's stop.
It was whilst trying to find the Travelodge in Llanelli that we hit our first problem. I'd banged the search criteria into my Sat Nav and we'd set off in the car. On arriving at what we thought was our hotel, we discovered that we'd arrive at Llanelli Cross, which wasn't our intended stay. We were about 8 miles from Llanelli. This was really frustrating, particularly so as it was raining hard and the driving was quite difficult. It was the only Llannelli Travelodge that my Sat Nav had returned, and, for goodness sake, why have two hotels with the name Llanelli. Anyway, a 15 minute drive had us at our intended hotel.
Even after these problems, we still arrived at our Travelodge hotel in good time. We made ourselves a cup of tea and relaxed in our room a short time. We then headed out on the short distance to Nando's restaurant, where we had a table reservation. We enjoyed our spicy chicken meals washed down with Sangria. Then we walked across the street to the Odeon, where we had seats booked to watch the latest Star Wars film, The Force Awakens, in 3D. It was a most enjoyable evening.
And in fact the whole day had been extremely rewarding and interesting. A really successful day, one in which Helen and I felt that we had accomplished all that we had hoped to do.
The long walk at Pembrey Country Park. It was actually Pembrey Country Park Plus, since some of the time was spent walking to, and beyond, the country park. It was a full day's walking, and both Helen and I were quite tired by the time we got back to our car.
Our walk started from Burry Port. We walked from here a distance of 3 kms to the boundary of Pembrey Country Park. I chose the car park I did because it was one of the few options shown on my Ordnance Survey map. Subsequently, on walking through Pembrey Country Park, we saw a map of the park, and discovered that there were in fact 9 car parks available within the park. Why these are not shown on the map I do not know. But, as it so happened, Helen and I enjoyed the estuary walk section from Burry Port.
Upon reaching the boundary of Pembrey Country Park, we detoured right, which soon took us into woods. The first section of our walk was largely through woods. We skirted around the park, following the Pembrey Country Park walk route that I had downloaded to my Garmin GPS. We then walked on from this route extending our walk loop, and heading towards the beach some distance on from the walk on my GPS. We then walked a length of the beach.
The panoramic photo below shows the point at which our path emerged from the forest and led us through these sand dunes onto the beach.
There was no easy route off from the beach on this next stretch of our walk. For that reason, I was keen to get the beach walking behind us before we broke for lunch. It was evident that when the tide was in, the majority of the beach was under the sea. There was just the possibility that one could become stranded. After we had walked the beach for some time, we came to the point where a trail led off from the beach. We chose this spot to stop for some lunch. The time was 13:00.
After lunch we took the path from the beach up through the dunes. This led us through shrubs and into trees. There was a small picnic site at this spot. Ironic, we thought, as we'd picnicked on the beach just 100 metres from this picnic spot. Still, we wouldn't have swapped our views of the beach and the sea for the comfortable benches we now saw.
The path was easy to follow through the dunes topped with trees. It is perhaps surprising that trees thrive at all in such hostile surroundings. The ‘soil’ must hold negligible nutrients, and the exposure to high winds must be quite searing.
Walking on, we approached the centre of Pembrey Country Park. Here, we found a small lake, by which was a sign showing the layout of the park and where we were. Helen, seeing that there were 9 car parks shown on the map, chuckled away. I'd parked at the only park to be found on Ordnance Survey maps, at Burry Port, some 3 kms from the park. Once again, ironic that we should find 9 car parks in Pembrey Country Park, not shown on maps. Ah well; such is life.
I joked with Helen about the lack of an ice cream salesman, something that would never happen in Devon. Then we stumbled upon a little chalet that, although closed, evidently sold ice creams in season, but not today. The adjacent toilets were also closed.
Walking on, we then passed a dry ski slope that was proving quite popular. This is adjacent to a club house, which appeared to be part of a camping site. Eventually we picked up our path along the estuary once again, and made our way back to where our car was parked at Burry Port. We paused briefly for a cup of tea and a little biscuit dunking, before heading off for our next stop, which was the Travelodge at St Clears.
This time we had no problem reaching our intended Travelodge hotel. We put the kettle on upon entering our room, and had another cup of tea. Then we set off for the village, in the hope of finding somewhere to eat. My first choice place to eat, Bombay Spice, we discovered was only a take-away, so we needed to find some other place. Our appetite whetted for a curry, we were in luck, when we stumbled upon an Indian restaurant in St Clears named Elaichi. We had a superb meal here, washed down with a bottle of wine. Just what we needed after our day on the hoof.
Walk Statistics:
Total Distance: 21.3 km / 13.2 miles
Elapsed Time: 5hrs 10min
Total Ascent: 149 metres
Buses: (none)
Drove to Burry Port where we parked our car for walk start/finish
This was to be our final day in Wales. We had a plan. Our plan in the first instance was to head down to Laugharne to visit the castle and the one-time home of Dylan Thomas, the Boathouse. We didn't know whether either would be open at this time of year, but trusted to luck. We found that we were half lucky, in that the castle wasn't open but the Boathouse was.
In some respects the castle not being open wasn't a major disappointment, as the most imposing view of it is that from outside the castle. This, and viewing the landscape in which the castle sits, on the banks of this wide estuary, makes a very impressive view.
We wandered past the castle and made our way towards the Boathouse, which can easily be seen from the front of the castle. The path climbed along the hillside, and then followed a narrow lane.
The path we followed eventually led to a gate that opened onto steps descending to the Boathouse. We were pleased to find the place open.
We entered the door and found ourselves in what was obviously a small souvenir shop with ticket desk. There was no one sat at the desk, but a man standing in the shop informed me that the person responsible was baking on the lower floor. I trundled down some stairs and called into what appeared to be the kitchen. A person responded. She said she'd be right with us. I mentioned her 'other priorities'. To which she replied, 'Yes, my other priority was scone making.'
As we entered, a brief, 8 minute DVD of Dylan Thomas's life and times was about to start, so Helen and I made our way to the room showing this presentation. It gave us a useful background insight into Dylan Thomas, and his time with his family at the Boathouse.
Dylan Thomas was evidently a troubled man. Troubled in his work, and troubled in his need to pay the bills. His medicine was drink, of which he partook wholeheartedly. This being what killed him when he died in New York in 1953 at the age of 39. His 'Under Milk Wood', Laugharne, he described as 'the strangest town in Wales'. He commented on the fact that the people spoke with an English accent.
Helen and I strolled around the house. It must look very much like the house that Dylan Thomas and his family lived in, fitted out as it is with furniture that dates from the 1950s. There is a considerable amount of memorabilia dotted about the house.
Outside, it's possible to walk into what at one time was the old harbour, where coal was once brought ashore. Today this area is completely walled in, having no opening to the sea, although apparently it can still flood at high tide. A boat shed once stood within this harbour (shown below). Below is a photograph of the harbour as it appears today, and next to it an image of how this scene once looked.
Helen and I walked from the Boathouse along the lane, and dropping down steeply, followed the shoreline back to the car park. From there we picked up what is known as the Birthday Walk. This walk follows 'the shoulder' of Sir John's Hill, which is thought to be the inspiration for Milk Wood. From the walk, there are extensive views over the marshy grounds and sand flats.
Helen and I returned to the car, grabbed our picnic bag and flask, and made for one of the picnic benches sheltered from the chill wind. We were sitting beneath the towering walls of Laugharne Castle just a couple of metres behind us. The sun was shining, and this made the perfect spot to break for lunch.
After lunch we drove on to Pendine. My plan had been to walk part of the long beach. On arriving we parked close to the little village of Pendine. We decided to first take a look around, for the particular purpose of finding a dragon. I had said to Helen that we cannot leave Wales without a red dragon. And, sure enough, in the village post office, there were numerous souvenir red dragons to be found. We both chose dragon fridge magnets for our collections.
Back on the beach, we started to stroll along the sands. The wind was quite strong, and enormous white horses were being whipped up from the tips of the waves. We must have become really distracted, since we missed the danger sign stating firing was taking place. I'd misconceived what the sign and red flag were. I thought it was simply a warning to bathers. But, apparently this was MOD land, and a man in a tractor strongly advised, unless we wished to get shot, that we return along the beach.
As we had a long drive ahead of us, we thought it as well that we set off. It was by now about 14:30, so we began the long and arduous journey home. We had nearly 190 miles to cover before we'd be in sight of Exeter. I did say to Helen I wondered how far it was as the crow flies. I can now report that that straight-line distance is 83 miles. Oh, to be a crow.
On reaching Exeter, we decided to plump for Kentucky Fried Chicken for our supper. Helen and I were both very tired, and anyway, this is a traditional holiday meal of ours, and we'd yet to have it on this holiday. This proved to be absolutely the right decision.
We'd not seen Dartmoor, and Helen loves Dartmoor. The weather forecast for today looked really good, so we decided to make that our destination. An additional reason for this trek was our having watched the Sherlock Holmes series 1 and 2 this holiday, and the episode entitled The Hounds of Baskerville which we'd watched, we easily recognised as having a significant scene shot at our old favourite haunt of Hound Tor. We’d been coming here since Helen and Laura were children. There was a picture of Holmes (Benedict Cumberbatch) standing on the high rocks of Hound Tor, and Helen and I were determined to replicate it.
The weather looked fine as we set off from Exeter. We stopped briefly at the Toys 'r' Us store, as Helen wanted to have a quick look around for any possible educational toys that she might take back to Germany, but she didn't find anything. On reaching Hound Tor, the skies opened, and it poured with rain. We chose to sit in the car and eat our picnic lunch in the hope that things would improve.
They did; improve, that is. The sun came out, and so we grabbed our coats and trekked across the very soggy ground up the slope of Hound Tor. Helen, Laura and I would come here long ago when Helen and Laura were very young, and they would have great fun scrambling on the rocks.
We sought out the rock on which Benedict Cumberbatch had stood. I'd loaded a photo of the scene onto my mobile. It took a bit of trial and error to find the spot, and we didn't match it exactly, but we did get close enough to capture an extremely similar shot. Ours is the photo without the CGI enhanced inclusion of the Baskerville laboratory.
Once having got our replicated photo, we strolled across to Greator Rocks. From here there are fine views across the valley to Haytor. We then circled around and down to the Medieval Settlement. This is the best of its type on Dartmoor. The numerous dwellings of this medieval village can very clearly be made out. It's interesting to speculate upon the kind of life these people would have had in this often bleak and hostile landscape.
From Hound Tor we decided to drive past Bonehill, another granite outcrop that we are very familiar with. Driving on, we dropped steeply down a narrow moss-lined and dripping lane until eventually reaching the village of Widecombe in the Moor.
Parking in Widecombe, Helen and I took a brief stroll around the souvenir shops. Helen found herself a very nice schnapps glass. In the same shop we came across what is claimed to be an ancient chair that once belonged to Uncle Tom Cobley. We stopped for the obligatory photos. We chatted briefly with the lady behind the counter. I explained our legitimacy (being descended from Tom’s sister Jane Cobley as we are) to sit in that chair. We also explained our Sherlock Holmes reason for being in the area.
On returning to our car, we felt we had a little time to spare before returning home, and, as the weather was fine, we felt a high moorland stroll would be a really nice way to round off our day. I checked our map for a suitable destination. I realised that Dr Blackall's Drive wasn't far from us, and so we set off in that direction, Helen doing the map reading and scaring off the cows.
As the walking was along a sand and gravel track, this was relatively dry underfoot, which made for easy walking. A little way out, we branched off right onto Mel Tor. From here we had excellent views down to the River Dart in the valley far below. Despite the distance, we could hear the river rushing down its narrow channel.
Looking over our shoulder as we headed back to our car, we found the clouds, many of which were streaming fast over our head, were making all sorts of patterns in the light of the setting sun. It proved a lovely stroll with which to round off a splendid day on Dartmoor.
On our way home we stopped off at Tesco to pick up some food for our evening meal. And Helen used this opportunity to also stock up on some things to take back to Germany. She had a range 'orders' from various people.
We drove around to Mum's for supper. We'd not seen so much of Mum this holiday. She had not been feeling well, and today she was quite poorly. We got her new smartphone up and working (required a power down/up), and showed her how to use her phone. We then cooked a pasta bake, using up various meats and cheeses left over from the raclette meal that we'd prepared earlier in our holiday. It turned out really well, and even Mum, who didn't have much of an appetite, tucked into a little food.
We'd been informed by my sister that there was a major football match on in Exeter this evening, something Helen and I were quite oblivious to. Apparently Exeter were playing Liverpool in the FA Cup. Mum was keen to watch this match, so we left her sat in front of the television, watching Exeter take an early lead (eventually the match ended in a draw).
Helen and I returned home to watch one last Sherlock programme that was available to us. There'd been a broadcast of The Abominable Bride, the first programme of series 4, over the Christmas holidays, and this was now available on iPlayer. It was a most confusing episode. Much of the story is about what is happening in Sherlock's 'mind palace'. This, a labyrinth of facts and insights, is the place where Sherlock goes to solve his mysteries. In this programme there was a twist to the usual ploy of the mine palace, in that entering into it took Sherlock and Dr Watson to an earlier time, the time of the Emelia Ricoletti murders in 1890. As I say, pretty confusing. I think I need a second shot at this story.
The final day of Helen's holiday. Helen was keen for some exercise if possible. We searched around for Cluedo online, but concluded, if Helen wants this, she might just as well order it from Amazon in Germany. This left us free for a swim. There was a lot of rain about, so this seemed a good choice. In fact the pool wasn't too crowded, which meant Helen and I were able to swim our usual amount, for me, that was a 1 km swim.
The timing was perfect, except for the torrential rain as I dashed for our car. We'd agreed to meet with my sister-in-law, Christine, at the Mill on the Exe, for lunch. We'd just got out of our car when Christine and her daughter Louise also showed up in the car park.
Helen and I settled for fish and chips, my first of the holiday, Helen's second. Christine, after a period of time, had to drive Louise over to her place of work. My brother David was expected to show up, but never did, excusing himself on the grounds of the dreadful weather, him being on his motorbike.
After lunch we drove home before setting off on foot to Mum's. My sister Wendy was passing us in her car, and offered us a lift, as it was raining. My brothers Michael and David joined us, as did Becky and Sarah, and Becky's young child Finley. Later in the evening my brother-in-law Colin, helping with a pantomime, also joined us.
Helen and I heated up the leftovers from the pasta bake that we had cooked on the previous night. Wendy prepared Mum a toasted cheese sandwich.
We said our goodbyes, as this would be the last Helen would see of her English family on this holiday, and made our way home. Helen had a little packing still to do. After having done that, she retired to her bedroom to get some rest ahead of her night coach journey to Heathrow. I made Helen a marmalade toasted sandwich for her breakfast, along with some small drinks. I then sat to complete some more of this diary, as there was no point in my going to bed.
At midnight Helen arose from her slumber and we both had one final hot drink before setting out into the cold. The coach tracker web site indicated Helen's coach would be about 25 minutes late (scheduled time 01:10). We arrived at the coach stop slightly ahead of the scheduled time, as this is recommended by National Express. It was 1:40 when the coach arrived. We had a few moments to say our sad goodbyes before Helen was whisked away. We hoped the coach would make up some time, as Helen didn't have much time to spare, as scheduled arrival time for the coach at Heathrow coach station was 05:30, and Helen's flight was scheduled for 07:30.
I monitored Helen's coach from the comfort of my bed. I could see it gradually making up time, reaching Heathrow only 8 minutes later than its scheduled time. This I knew would give Helen ample time to make her flight. I popped a Skype message to Helen to say I could see she was at Heathrow in time for her flight. Helen replied a few minutes later, saying how much she had enjoyed her holiday. She told me in a message just prior to boarding she was watching her flight being loaded.
I then followed Helen's flight on Flight Radar (Flight Number: BA918). The flight took off on schedule and was a few minutes early into Stuttgart, with touchdown at 09:58. I popped another Skype message to Helen, to say I could see she had arrived by in Germany.
What a holiday that was. Our holidays are always hectic, but this was something else. Helen's feet didn't touch the ground. Well, except on the numerous occasions we sat down to watch a Sherlock TV programme. We'd done so many great things. And we were well exercised too. It had been the most wonderful of Christmases. The only thing we failed to do was get our English breakfast at a Wetherspoons, as we were done out of this by the need to get heating sorted in my home. Ah well, there'll be other opportunities for that, and, all-in-all, a thoroughly fun packed holiday.
Did I fail in my cycling objective for 2015? I had hoped to cycle 2,000 kms in 2015, and tried hard to achieve that, but fell just short. I even did a couple of cycle rides with Helen during this Christmas holiday (Torbay and Exmouth), and yet I fell slightly short. In part this was due to the turmoil of losing heating at my home just before Christmas. But, when Helen and I looked at my distance, and we saw that it was precisely 1984, the year in which Helen was born, we both decided that, as that was such a nice number, we'd not let it worry us.
Films watched this holiday, most with Helen, a few on my own: Star Wars - The Force Awakens (Llanelli Odeon); The Hundred Foot Journey (Google Play free film with Chromecast); The Imitation Game; Argo; Paddington; Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, Man of Steel [Superman], Midnight in Paris, & Mr Turner (all Amazon Prime, free membership for 30 days). Made in Dagenham (BBC iPlayer); TV series watched this holiday: Sherlock Holmes series 1-3 (Amazon Prime).
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