Northampton, 26th May
After a period of time at home, (over six weeks!), it was time to go travelling again and we had tickets for a music festival at Kelmarsh Hall near Northampton. We enjoyed 4 days of music performed by ‘tribute bands’ including main acts of The Illegal Eagles, Killer Queen, Steve Steinman’s Meatloaf Story, Badness and a Neil Diamond’s Beautiful Noise, with many others filling the afternoons and early evening. There was plenty of space, the ground was dry and it was sunny, although very cold at night which made sitting around a bit uncomfortable.
Kelmarsh Hall itself was open to the public, the rooms were beautifully displayed had information to read about various pieces of furniture etc. The Hall is used for functions and had a wedding the previous day, so there were many tables set up with beautiful floral arrangements. Outside were truly beautiful walled gardens with so much colour, a large greenhouse, wild flower area and vegetable garden. The many acres outside the immediate garden had a wood and large lake which would have made a lovely backdrop to wedding photos, but not while we were there with many hundreds of white motorhomes blotting the landscape!
Abermule near Welshpool, 30th May
We joined our ‘ Burstners Owners Rally’ on the sports field of Abermule village for 5 nights. There was a very good wine and cheese gathering which was a great success, quiz night, pub meal, and strawberries and cream one afternoon. We met up with my Mum and sister Emma and visited a nearby garden at Glansevern which was a nice walk around and then returned for a natter at the campsite.
The campsite was situated very close to the Montgomery Canal and over 3 days we walked the length from Welshpool to Newtown in 5 mile sections using the bus to facilitate an outward journey and one return to the campsite. One of the attractions for us was a set of 60+ Geocaches and it added another dimension to our walks. Most of the sections we walked were not navigable by boat although we did see a couple of kayaks. The pathways were clear and lined with wildflowers which made walking such a pleasure, passing by cattle and lambs in the fields, a horse show, and a few locks made it quite picturesque. My son and his Australian wife visited us having just returned from their honeymoon, we walked a short section of the canal together before spending a few hours hearing about their time to Croatia.
Ledbury, Herefordshire, 4th June
This was a consecutive Burstner Owners Rally and it was in walking distance of the very pretty town of Ledbury. Although we had previously lived only 30 miles north of the town for a many years, neither of us had ever visited or explored it. The beautiful black and white Market Hall was the prominent feature on the high street, built in 1617 and is still used for events in the town. Church Street was a nice walk off the main street with lovely old buildings, a small garden and of course the old church with it’s separate tower and spire all built at separate times between 1320 to 1732. We also visited a small building with old wall paintings that looked like tapestries that had been discovered during renovations. The guide told us it was possibly a middle class homeowner who couldn’t afford real tapestry, so the paintings we the next best thing!
We enjoyed walks around the footpaths, lanes and fields and visited Eastnor Castle with a guided tour informing us about each of the rooms. It was a very ‘homely’ castle, in excellent condition and had many interesting features and a magnificent collection of armour from a previous occupant. Unfortunately we didn’t walk in the grounds, but instead we returned over the hill and down through the woods back to our motorhome, 11 miles in total that day, not too shabby!
We also used the bus and travelled to Ross on Wye for the day , walking around the town and following a Cacheing route which lead us around the town. There was street art on some of the buildings, several medieval looking houses and the old market hall was set out with plant stalls on the day we visited.
Stratford on Avon, 26th June
After two weeks back at home to tidy the garden, do washing and restock the motorhome, we off again. This time we were away for 4 nights, meeting up with motorhoming friends from all over the UK, all having initially met each other spending the winters in Jávea, Spain.
There were 7 motorhomes and one caravan, 16 of us all together, and in some cases we hadn’t seen each other for 4 or 5 years due to Covid and other factors. There was much chatting and swapping of stories and general catching up to be done over drinks in the sunshine. We played boules in a knockout competition which declared Gilly and Brian the winners and another afternoon we had a music quiz organised by Paul which the ladies team won. Kenny instructed us in the art of Crown Green bowling where we enjoyed an afternoon learning how the ‘woods’ performed with the sided weighted bias, which was excellent. We split into various groups and went into Stratford walking around the sights, enjoying coffees and lunch and took a water taxi back to the campsite.
A few of us are keen Geocachers, and a route was picked out nearby that would give us all a nice walk around the lanes and footpaths of nearby Tiddington and we collected another tally of caches to add to our respective totals. We just had to pose by the signpost, it made us all laugh!
At the campsite was a good restaurant where we all got together for a meal and drinks overlooking the river. We had spent a lovely time together got to know each other again and hopefully next year we’ll be meeting together at another location.
Our motorhome adventures 