And we thought Abu Dhabi airport was slow & inefficient! Heathrow topped the list. Gill was lucky, having a UK passport only took about 1/4 hour to get through immigration. Rick took over 1 hour.
We picked up our hire car, a Ford Focus manual with less than 2k miles on it. Gear ratios are taking a bit of getting used to, I realised at one stage I had been driving in 3rd gear for 10-15 mins. The engine is also very quiet. Lots of room in the car & all our luggage fits out of sight in the back.
We were pretty tired yesterday having slept very little in the plane from Abu Dhabi to London. We stopped in a small town, not long after we left London, for coffee. We assumed that, because the cafe had an espresso machine and was staffed by Italians, the coffee would be just what we needed to give us a boost. All I’ll say is that the coffee wouldn’t win any awards.
We stopped for lunch in Winchester and had a brief look at the cathedral. With no spire it was not all that impressive from the outside although it is a big building. As is the case with so many English towns, there are some really impressive buildings, not necessarily big, but old and aesthetically pleasing. On to Dorchester to the Sydney Arms Hotel for the night. Great little pub with really friendly staff. The hotel was on the edge of town, 5 mins walk to the centre, and our room overlooked the main road through town. Had to open the window because it was so warm (23 deg), so it was a bit noisy. We were not aware of any vehicles passing during the night and on the few times we woke during the night, it was dead quiet. It may be that we were so tired that we didn’t notice (or the bottle & a half of wine that we had with dinner may have had some effect).
We thought that we were being so organised arranging for a couple of sim cards to be delivered to the hotel for our first night. We ordered them a couple of months ago, but they didn’t arrive – the hotel people were expecting them. We had to buy 2 more. C’est la vie!
We spent a couple of hours walking around Dorchester this morning & we are starting to think that the standard coffee here is about half the strength we are used to, so it’ll be 2 shots from now on.
We passed through Lyme Regis (the setting for the book “The French Lieutenant’s Woman”) on the way to Seaton. We’d heard the name of
the town but didn’t know a lot about the place. It’s a very attractive (and crowded today) sea side village and at stages the main road through is only wide enough for 1 car. It’s very old, an ancient royal borough, hilly with twisting roads and interesting views of a mixture of the rooftops, both old and modern. Not much parking in the centre, but we were lucky enough to find one for 2 hours.
On to Seaton for the night and found a nice little B&B about 100m from the beach – we can see the water from our upstairs room. As usual, there is not a lot of parking, the car is currently in the Tesco supermarket car park, 5 mins from the B&B and we can park it along the foreshore road overnight. The road in front of the B&B is narrow and there is only room in the street for 7-8 cars. Another warm day today and we’ve run out of warm weather clothes. Didn’t wash clothes in Bangkok. Had to buy a t shirt for tomorrow.
Just back from dinner at a local pub, 5 mins walk. Not so much wine tonight. It's great seeing the sea & hearing the very English sea gulls. Still very light (almost 9pm), and, from our window, the sea looks blue and flat.
We picked up our hire car, a Ford Focus manual with less than 2k miles on it. Gear ratios are taking a bit of getting used to, I realised at one stage I had been driving in 3rd gear for 10-15 mins. The engine is also very quiet. Lots of room in the car & all our luggage fits out of sight in the back.
We were pretty tired yesterday having slept very little in the plane from Abu Dhabi to London. We stopped in a small town, not long after we left London, for coffee. We assumed that, because the cafe had an espresso machine and was staffed by Italians, the coffee would be just what we needed to give us a boost. All I’ll say is that the coffee wouldn’t win any awards.
We stopped for lunch in Winchester and had a brief look at the cathedral. With no spire it was not all that impressive from the outside although it is a big building. As is the case with so many English towns, there are some really impressive buildings, not necessarily big, but old and aesthetically pleasing. On to Dorchester to the Sydney Arms Hotel for the night. Great little pub with really friendly staff. The hotel was on the edge of town, 5 mins walk to the centre, and our room overlooked the main road through town. Had to open the window because it was so warm (23 deg), so it was a bit noisy. We were not aware of any vehicles passing during the night and on the few times we woke during the night, it was dead quiet. It may be that we were so tired that we didn’t notice (or the bottle & a half of wine that we had with dinner may have had some effect).
We thought that we were being so organised arranging for a couple of sim cards to be delivered to the hotel for our first night. We ordered them a couple of months ago, but they didn’t arrive – the hotel people were expecting them. We had to buy 2 more. C’est la vie!
We spent a couple of hours walking around Dorchester this morning & we are starting to think that the standard coffee here is about half the strength we are used to, so it’ll be 2 shots from now on.
We passed through Lyme Regis (the setting for the book “The French Lieutenant’s Woman”) on the way to Seaton. We’d heard the name of
the town but didn’t know a lot about the place. It’s a very attractive (and crowded today) sea side village and at stages the main road through is only wide enough for 1 car. It’s very old, an ancient royal borough, hilly with twisting roads and interesting views of a mixture of the rooftops, both old and modern. Not much parking in the centre, but we were lucky enough to find one for 2 hours. 
On to Seaton for the night and found a nice little B&B about 100m from the beach – we can see the water from our upstairs room. As usual, there is not a lot of parking, the car is currently in the Tesco supermarket car park, 5 mins from the B&B and we can park it along the foreshore road overnight. The road in front of the B&B is narrow and there is only room in the street for 7-8 cars. Another warm day today and we’ve run out of warm weather clothes. Didn’t wash clothes in Bangkok. Had to buy a t shirt for tomorrow.
Just back from dinner at a local pub, 5 mins walk. Not so much wine tonight. It's great seeing the sea & hearing the very English sea gulls. Still very light (almost 9pm), and, from our window, the sea looks blue and flat.
I'm enjoying following your travels and this is just the beginning of your trip! It's count down here with exams reports etc. I am starting to feel that I'll never get myself organised to be on the plane for France in a couple of weeks.
ReplyDeleteStay safe. Bisous, Gail
Hi Rick and Gill,
ReplyDeleteLooks like you have made it safely to Europe and have also enjoyed some amazing stopovers along the way. Enjoying all the photos and especially the one of your Rick perfectly assuming the model pose in front of the Lyme Fossil Shop. Did they pay you a fee for being part of their display? :)
Good luck with the parking challenges and finding that perfect coffee.
Keep up the fantastic memoirs, we are all enjoying the journey with you