Beamish re-Visited

28 years ago with a 18 month old Marc in tow we visited Beamish, at the time we thought it was a great open air museum, this time it was absolutely amazing, there has been a lot added over the years to create a wonderful snapshot of times gone by. Still being the school holidays Beamish was humming, the queue for the sweet shop went halfway down the village street & there was a staggered start to get into the tearooms ! A living museum it truly is, horse & carts, miners, bakers, tram conductors, everywhere people in period dress, and very knowledgeable about their work amazing. Well worth a visit, this place is continually evolving and growing very unique, Loved it.

Up and Away. A day in the Toon

Finally got a fullish night sleep so ready to hit the Town that doesn't open till 11 because it's bank holiday monday. so with a car full Andrew heads off to find us a park close to town which he duly succeeds at. with a costa coffee breakfast under our belts we hit Eldon Square to check out the shops. standing outside the Adidas shop we thought this would be a great time to find Marc's request of a new pair of shoes, with a blink of my eye Jacqui spots a womens fashion shop and does a runner. 10 minutes of searching she was spotted checking out the racks, i have to say she didn't find anything this time but its only a matter of time before I'll be looking like a pack horse under a weight of clothing. with PC World calling we ventured into sort out a mobile wireless box to help us during our Grand Cruising Tour. Well that was an eye opener and I suggest anyone coming to the UK on holiday to make a friend with a UK address and save yourself a bucketful of money. Now we have a rolling monthly contract and can keep in contact through messenger and facetime. 

On we tracked to Pri mark a clothing store and we picked a few bits for the grandies. the realisation of bank holidays kicked in with the crowd of people that grew in town. You forget over time when you live in such a quiet place as Te Awamutu and New Zealand what a vibrant place this is, the buskers were amazing and you feed off the energy of city life, but saying that, after 4 hours i was ready for some peace and quiet. this didn't happen as we headed onto what turned out to be a cultural festival, indian music and dancers strutting their stuff, there was such diversity in people and cultures. taking some time to soak up what was going on before we headed to the Hancock Museum for some quiet informative time, history can sometimes just be forgotten and it's always good to soak up what where who why and how we have got to this point in time. People before us had it harder and achieved more than we will in our lifetimes. Man achieves amazing things in their darkest times. with time ticking on we head back to the car and back to Benwell, another busy day closes. tomorrow is Beamish etc  

St Mary's and Family.

well today's the day that had a full spectrum of emotions a day that the mallett clan got together to farewell one of their own at the waters of St Mary's lighthouse, it was also an amazing day of hugs tears, sadness laughter and good times as jacqui and lee reunited with family around the BBQ. A massive thank you has to go to the family for organising the food and to Chef Andrew on the charcoal. tomorrow we start the touristy stuff.

Angel Hunting

O Dear, sleep is still not my friend so at 1 am I planned my Hotel escape for the crack of dawn. With camera in hand I headed out to find a very quiet town at 6 am, with fishing boats coming and going as the sun rose i had my chance to own the streets and get some shots. Heading back I took the chance to spend some time with the beach huts and soak up the sea air.

with a 2 hour trek north to Newcastle we waved farewell to Whitby a town that promised lots and Delivered even more. with family waiting GPS Lee and SatNav Jacqui got us to our first point of call in the North East, that being the Angel of the North. the iconic piece of sculpture that welcomes all to Newcastle, photo's don't do it justice. after a quick trip into the team valley trading estate for a couple of things, on we go to Audrey and Erics for a cuppa a catchup and cake, before finishing our day at Andrew & Karen's house.

A Day at the Seaside

It's a Biggy. today started with breakfast at Lee's favorite shop Greggs, which wasn't quite the Full English that I had thought I may get A walk about in Melton and a clothes shop for Jacqui just to get her eye in as one would say. next up where's my Pork Pie. having previously checked out where I was going we headed to the shop, feeling a tad peckish I felt the need to buy 3. as we don't yet have wireless on the go we saw vodafone as our best bet so sort it out.we have figured out that Vodafone UK is pretty similar to NZ, it employs strange people that are NOT customer focused in any shape or form and that the tourist with money to spend is still not an insentive to either smile or interact on a human level. after a quick cuppa we head off from our Hotel to find the nearest traffic jam that just happened to be outside our gate. had a chat with a elderly gentleman driving the other way who gave us the news that its worse where we are going. Our journey today is finish at the quiet fishing town of Whitby (Mmmmm) with GPS Lee and his system set to go we found that even google maps has the odd glitch. with a culmination of diversions trailers caravans and sainsbury truck that is limited to 50mph we finally arrived in whitby the longest way possible although we did get to go over the humber bridge and found single lane tracks to fill in time. we decided that after finding a place named UGGLEBARNBY that we will be playing the oddest name game daily.
Whitby, what can I say, Brilliant would be a good start, I don't normally do crowds but on this occasion it was well worth it. it bought back childhood visits to the coast, the sights and sounds the Fish n Chips, gulls, school holiday crowds  a folk festival with Morris Dancers Whitby was buzzing. with what felt like 7294 steps in town and up to the abbey ruins you certainly get a work out. Jacqui got herself a beautiful piece of Jet Jewelry and we finished off the day with fish n chips on the pier. I fell in love with this place. plenty of photo's to edit when i get the time. onwards to
newcastle tomorrow

Kicking it off

Yippee Do. Well it took longer to get through security mainly because the E system broke as we landed. so our first contact with England became a looooooong Queue. But apart from that the whole trip went well right upto the M25 haha, a minor 10 minute delay as GPS Lee got his system online and we headed north to Bletchley Park. Now that was definitely a good choice to start our trip.

what an amazing property. I could just amagine timmy and his chums with lashings of ginger beer having a picnic on the lawn by the lake as they shorted out the war. Seriously though, a very very good insight as to their part in the war effort. we finished off our day at Melton Mowbray looking forward to catching up with some long overdue sleep. Tomorrow we head north to Whitby.

6 Days to go

Wow where did the time Go. 6 days to go and we fly out for our amazing 6 week holiday to the U.K, the plans are in place and we kick off the day when we land with a trip to Bletchley Park and onward to Melton Mowbray for a pork pie and our crash pad for the night.