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It’s been quite some time since we’ve posted as most of 2020 (and the beginning of 2021) have been a wash out as far as trips are concerned. We did manage two trips between lockdown 1 and lockdown 2. 

The first was a trip we made with the Opus to a site called Love 2 Stay. Unfortunately, we didn’t Love 2 Stay and we renamed it to Love 2 Leave. We had originally booked to stay for 6 nights, however we left after 3. It was mainly issues with disabled facilities that cut short our trip. The bathrooms had a swipe card to get in (not sure why), toilets that flushed by waving your hand in front of a sensor, washbasins that worked by waving your hand in front of a sensor, with showers that operated in a similar way. The disabled bathroom was accessed by swiping your card into the washing up and laundry area, then swiping another card to open the door to the disabled bathroom. However, the disabled bathroom is not signposted from the outside, so I only found it by chance as I was being nosy and wondered what was behind the door! The swipe card system was extremely difficult for John to manage on his own - firstly making sure that he used the correct card on the correct door, as there’s two different cards needed to access the disabled bathroom, then making sure that he was waving the card in the correct place. It meant that every time John wanted to go to the bathroom that someone had to go with him. It would have been so much simpler to use a standard RADAR key on the door. The shower in the disabled bathroom also required that you waved a hand in front of a sensor to switch it on. The shower was on a timer, so you had to wave your hand several times to get a proper shower. The shower was impossible for John to use on his own as he had no idea where the sensor was, so that he could wave his hand in front of it. That provided some amusing bathroom scenes with me standing there telling him to wave his hand “up a bit, down a bit, right a bit...” well you get the picture!

The second trip we managed to get in just before lockdown 2 and this was on a fish & chip train. This was on the Ecclesbourne Valley steam railway. It was very well organised with social distancing maintained throughout and masks being worn in public areas. Each party had their own carriage, where masks didn’t have to be worn, and the train travelled through the beautiful Derbyshire countryside. On arrival at our destination, we got our fish & chips and ate them while the train made its way back to our starting point.  We really enjoyed this trip and the fish & chips were pretty good too.

We are currently in lockdown 3, although the vaccination programme is going well, and we have a ‘road map’ out of lockdown, providing that everything continues to go well. We’re hoping that this is successful, so that 2021 doesn’t turn out to be the washout that 2020 was. We’re really looking forward to being able to go out again and, me especially, really looking forward to being able to get a haircut!

In our latest video, we’ve looked at our top 5 things that we’ve done (plus a bonus!), and John got really excited(!) at hosting the top 5 in his best cheesy radio DJ voice!

The video can be seen here

Pot Painting at the Ceramic Cafe

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We booked a session at the Ceramic Cafe to do some pot painting and a chance to engage our inner children!

There’s a variety of different items available to paint - for example: mugs, plates, bowls, figures and teapots among others. The cost depends on the item that you wish to paint. On each table is a plate painted with all of the colours of paint available, so you can see what the colours look like once your item has been glazed and fired.

John selected a bowl with butterflies on it, I selected a teapot and George selected a mug. While you are painting, you can have hot drinks and snacks brought to you from the cafe section by the staff there.

Each session lasts around 2 hours and you pay for your pots, and any drinks or snacks at the end of the session. You then have a wait of around a week to 10 days before you can collect your pot, once it’s been glazed and fired. Alternatively, you can pay extra to have them posted to you.

We had a lot of fun painting our pots and we’re looking forward to getting our pots, once they’ve been glazed and fired.

We’ll post pictures of our finished pots on our Facebook and Instagram pages once we get them.

Half-Term

It’s the last day of the half-term holiday and we had all sorts of plans for different trips this week. Unfortunately the weather had different plans for us. With Storm Dennis following closely on the heels of Storm Ciara, there are several areas of the country that have been flooded. Luckily for us, we were not affected by flooding, we just had the wind and rain to contend with.

It was strange seeing images of Ironbridge, where we were a few weeks ago, being flooded and seeing parts of the road we walked along now being part of the River Severn. We really feel for everyone, everywhere, affected by the flooding and hope that things get back to normal as quickly as possible.

We chose to stay close to home for this week as none of us particularly like cold, wet and windy weather! John also has concerns about his hearing aids becoming wet, and if George needs to use his chair, we’ve found that it doesn’t cope well with wet surfaces. With hindsight, I wish that we’d got a chair that is a bit more rugged and can cope with wet or uneven surfaces better than the one that we have.

Hopefully the weather will start to improve for us, so we can get out and about again very soon 🙂

Concorde Tour at Manchester Airport

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We visited the Runway Park at Manchester Airport, so that we could tour the Concorde that is on display there.  I was really excited about this trip as I haven’t been on a Concorde since I worked for British Airways at London Heathrow.

This is a tour that has to be booked in advance and we had a 6 week wait from booking our slot, as we were restricted as to when we could visit.  There are steps up to the aircraft and you need to duck your head as you go through the door, so this is a tour that is unsuitable for those with really restricted mobility. We got to sit on the aircraft and were told various facts about the aircraft, and regaled with stories of famous people who have travelled on Concorde.

We also sat in the cockpit area and were given more information about the aircraft. I discovered that our guide in the cockpit worked at Heathrow at around the same time as I did, so we had a chat about the time that we worked there too.

After the tour was over, we went and had lunch in the cafe. We thought that it was reasonably priced, considering it was at an airport, and we enjoyed it.

I really enjoyed the day and my nostalgia trip!

Ford Green Hall 17th Century Yuletide

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We visited Ford Green Hall to find out how Christmas was celebrated in Tudor/Stuart times. There were a lot of fir tree branches and holly used as decorations. Whereas people may have a wreath on their front door nowadays; back then they simply had a fir tree branch hanging down, with some holly interspersed among the leaves, and the berries adding some red among all the green. My first impression was that they had half a tree hanging from the front door!

Moving inside, the decorations were the same inside the house. There were fir tree branches hanging down, with sprigs of holly, and some of them had candles in the decoration. The candles used weren’t real ones, but I can imagine that back in the 17th century, when they would have used real candles, that it was a bit of a fire hazard.

Every Christmas time, I have always wondered why mince pies are called ‘mince pies’ when they don’t have any meat in them.  After going into the kitchen area, we found out! I think, on balance, I prefer the mince pies we have today! We also discovered how wealthy people showed off their wealth at Christmas time and discovered just how expensive sugar was back then!

Heading upstairs, we found an area where you could make pomanders. Essentially, they had an orange and stuck cloves in it. This area was really busy and there was a queue of people waiting for a go. As George doesn’t cope well with crowds and waiting around, we decided the best option was to leave.

We decided to stop at a supermarket on the way home and get some oranges and cloves, so we could make our own pomanders at home. Fortunately, at the supermarket, I grabbed a basket rather than a trolley as we ended up getting mince pies, cake, Quality Street, Pringles and trifle mix, as well as the oranges and cloves that we’d originally gone in for! I dread to think what else we may have bought if I’d have grabbed a trolley!  We made our own pomanders at home and have placed them around the house, so every so often we get a waft of orange and cloves.

We enjoyed this visit to Ford Green Hall and found it really interesting finding how Christmas was celebrated in the 17th century.

Gladstone Pottery Museum Christmas Fun Day

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We visited Gladstone Pottery museum for their Christmas Fun Day, where John had the opportunity to throw a pot on a potters wheel. This is a small extra cost of £3 in addition to the admission fee and is available year round. John found it to be a really enjoyable experience, which was helped by the staff member there who took the time to help John and guide his hands.

When we went outside, we met a very tall fairy, from the top of a Christmas tree, and some naughty elves. The fairy was very friendly but the elves were trying to give children lumps of coal as Christmas presents! They did stop and pose with George for a Christmas ‘elfie’ though.

After this, we went back inside and had a go at painting some Christmas pottery. Again, this was a small extra cost in addition to the admission fee. How much extra depended on the size of the pot you chose to decorate. John and I chose to decorate some pottery tree decorations that cost £1 each. John had help from a staff member in there and really enjoyed his painting experience.

We looked at some other parts of the museum, and John was allowed to touch some of the items, so he had an idea of what it was we were looking at.

Our final stop was in the Doctor’s House, where we met Santa and Mrs Clause. John had a nice chat with Santa, and he gave both John and George some chocolate.

We had a really enjoyable time and, as we have found on previous occasions, found the staff to be really helpful in trying to make everything as accessible as possible. It is definitely worth a visit.

Middleport Pottery Christmas Lights Switch On

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We went to Middleport Pottery for their Christmas lights switch on. We hadn’t been there since we visited the Weeping Window exhibition, with the poppies, so we were looking forward to visiting this Victorian Pottery again.

When we arrived there were two queues of people - one for those who had bought advance tickets (as we had) and those who were paying on the gate. Both queues of people were being allowed in together, so it was very crowded.

One of the first things we did was to stop by a stall that was selling mulled wine, hot spicy apple juice and mince pies. We had the apple juice, which was delicious. Unfortunately it seems that Middleport Pottery had completely underestimated the number of people who turned up and they very quickly ran out of the mulled wine and apple juice.

There were several mini events scheduled before the main light switch on, however due to the sheer number of people there, it was virtually impossible to access them - especially for wheelchair users.

We missed the actual light switch on as we couldn’t get anywhere near it, again due to the sheer number of people there. We did see the lights after they’d been switched on and thought they looked very good, as they fitted in well with the Victorian style.

We think that the evening would have been much better if Middleport Pottery hadn’t allowed so many people in. Maybe it would have worked better if they’d allowed advance ticket holders in first, and then people who were paying on the gate afterwards, if there was enough capacity for them.

I don’t think it’s an event that we would want to go to next year as it seemed quite chaotic and disorganised. However, the pottery itself is an interesting place to visit.