Time appears to pass me by too quickly as here I am again catching up on the blog when I had planned to get it out a couple of weeks ago. We snuck away for a quick trip to take in some more of our beautiful British countryside and although we were only away for nine nights we managed to cover three different locations – two of which new to us – stopping at each for three nights of tranquility.

Our first stop was Broadway in Wiltshire, where we have been before, and although it is a little touristy due to its ‘picture perfect’ architecture and surroundings, it is a place we could keep going back to as it oozes beauty, especially at this time of year when the leaves are in colour and the grass is very green!

We previously stayed at the Caravan and Motorhome Club Site which is far bigger this time however, we had found a little CS to stay at (Northwick Farm £30 per night inc 10A elec), far more our kind of place as not only is it a beautiful, tranquil site with lovely views, we also had it to ourselves!

Despite the rain and muddy terrain it was a lovey few days combining a bit of walking, a little bit of mooching round the shops and a pub lunch with Liz, who came over to meet us with the dog for the day.

It was however, all too quickly time to leave Broadway behind us again and on the Friday we headed all of the 11 miles further West to Pershore where we had booked into Goodleigh CL. (£21.33 per night, electricity on a meter)

The CL was lovely with enormous, hard standing, serviced pitches all managed meticulously by a father and daughter team, providing huge amounts of information for walkers and cyclists both in the immediate vicinity and further afield.

Pershore was about a 10 minutes walk from the site with a good spread of cafes, pubs and restaurants in addition to possibly the smallest Abbey in the UK. The town is known for its Plums – yes, I did say Plums – with a ridiculous number of varieties being grown in the area dating back to 1827 and they even have a festival to celebrate them.

Needless to say, Pershore lacked Plums this time as we were too late for the season, but it did give lots of beauty – albeit in a very muddy form – as we explored a little further afield along the river and into the hills.

On the Sunday we had booked a table at the Swan Inn in Birlingham and set off on a 9/9.5 mile circular walk taking in the Malvern Hills and surrounding area. Despite being very grey and a little soggy under foot it was still beautiful, and although the muddiness meant it took us slightly longer than anticipated to get there, it was well worth it. The welcome, the food and the service – despite us being kitted out head to toe in wet gear and muddy wellies – were impeccable…. we will definately be back for more.

Moving on again on the Monday we set off after a wet and very windy morning run to Warwick. Warwick is a place that I had wanted to visit for a long time but we had just never really got round to it.

We had booked the Caravan and Motorhome Club Site (£26.80 per night inc.) which is in the middle of Warwick Racecourse and although the views were not quite as impressive as Cheltenham Race Course, it still wasn’t too bad. There was a lovely route around the racecourse which proved to be incredibly popular for many a dog walker and served well for my morning run, and the campsite itself was incredibly quiet which considering how close it was to the center of town and also the motorway was good.

After an initial reckie to check out Warwick we decided that apart from a pretty interesting looking coffee shop and a Castle that appears to be more of a theme park, it was a little lacking in substance – perhaps my fault for having great expectations. So, looking at the map we decided that we would venture over to Royal Lemington Spa the following day to see what it had to offer stretching our legs at the same time.

It was about an hours’ walk, all off road alongside the river, then the canal and finally through the park and in contrast to Warwick, Lemington Spa had a lovely feel to it. The park (Jephson Gardens) was beautiful and almost like an Arboreatum with its enormous variety of trees and the Aviary and it had a lovely town center made up of a mixture of boutique shops, restaurants and cafes – well worth the day trip…. and apart from a 30 minute burst of rain. We even managed to stay pretty dry and have a picnic in the park admiring the beautiful autumnal colours.

On our final day before we headed back to the farm we decided to explore a little further in the other direction. We walked along the canal and fell upon Hatton Locks – 21 locks rising 45 meters over a distance of roughly 2 miles – not too shabby considering they were built in 1799!

All in all the visit to Warwick was turning out to be quite an interesting one…. lots of beautiful places to explore, we just had to look for them, perhaps I should do a little more research into our surrounding areas in the future!

We have now finished our Mushroom Foraging Course for 2023 – I say for 2023 as it turns out to be quite addictive so we have put our names down again for next year. The whole process has been hugely educational and interesting and we have met some lovely people along the way. We reckon that we could possibly identify 4 or 5 edible mushrooms now, which although sounds pretty poor, is actually a really good number considering that there are so many similar looking fungi that could be poisonous…. maybe we will get into double figures by next year.

Believe it or not but the two photos below show the same species of funghi – The Trooping Funnel’ at different stages, all of which we growing within about 5 meters of one another. It just shows how they can change dramatically depending on how old they are … and we are talking about hours, rather than days difference in some cases.

The whole process of Mushroom foraging has opened up our eyes – as well as our whole families eyes – to incredible array of fungi out there in all different shapes and sizes and we now just have to get foraging and cooking!

We haven’t been cooking many new recipes in the last few weeks but we did return to an old favourite in a slightly different form… Falafels in sourdough tortillas…. absolutely delicious!

And I risked everything and cooked kipper kedgeree. A step outside my comfort zone as although I love fish, I am not a great fan of anything with lots of bones and with this recipe pretty much everything – skin and all – goes in albeit chopped up pretty small! It worked though and apart from a couple of the fin bones that I hadn’t filleted properly, I ate it all and it was pretty tasty. Whether I would cook this version again instead of our normal one I am not sure, but the spice level and flavour were good.

And finally, just a little map to show you the route we took…. we have already left on the next installment but I will do my best to update the blog a bit more quickly when we get back this time!

Well, although I had good intentions to finish the blog pretty soon after we came home from our last trip, it just didn’t happen. Life sometimes just takes over and other things took priority. Doesn’t matter as it is a good opportunity to look back over some recent photos with blue sky and sunshine just before we head off again for a next little trip!!

My last update was from just outside Durham with some cheeky little goats and lots of hills, following which we moved on to Barnard Castle Caravan Club Site (£35.40 per night) for a couple of nights.

Despite the rain we managed to enjoy the beautiful little market town which was scattered with coffee shops and antiques and the most impressive chateau which now houses the Bowes Museum. A beautiful tranquil area with lots of rabbits and rain and a fantastic array of local cheeses!

Heading southwards we decided to revisit an old favourit ‘The Cud Life’ just outside Harrogate so we could meet up with Mandy who had gone back home to Leeds following a pretty rough bout of Covid. Thankfully, now pretty much fully recovered from Covid she came and met us for lunch and a good catch up out of the rain – next time London!

We love this area as the scenery is so dramatic and managed to get one of my favourite walks in over to Knaresborough enabling us to take in a picnic on the River Nidd and get some of those beautiful views of the viaduct from the castle…. another place with lots of lovely coffee shops!

A hop skip and a jump further south and we got to one of the best small Campsites we have found this year ‘Lakeside Meadow CL’ which is just outside Asbourne (£23 per night).

The Campsite was situated on the edge of a lake and forest with lots of beautiful walking and a couple of excellent pubs closeby. We had chosen the area to catch up with Kevin and Petra as they are moored up not too far from here and are always up for a good feed! This time we were lucky enough to have the Red Lion Pub in Hollington less than a mile from the campsite whose speciality is Pie….. it is fair to say that all of the food was pretty good and well worth a return visit.

The last stop of the trip was back to see Gail and the kids – or not really so ‘kids’ any longer as they are both pretty much adults now – in Lutterworth. We stopped at our usual CL ‘Orchards View’ and were not disappointed by the normal Leicestershire beauty of hay bales and far reaching views.

Having had a lovely trip up to Scotland and back the plan was to spend the summer back at the farm mainly to avoid school holidays but also to celebrate a couple fo big family birthdays…. a weekend starting with sunshine and a BBQ, ending up inside with another amazing birthday cake made by Carly….

Summer was busy as always and we made the most of the weather but as always time passes far too quickly and September was soon upon us, providing a little opportunity for us to pop away for a few nights to Bath to celebrate Jo and Mikes’ 25th wedding anniversary and also to Cheltenham to catch up with Pete and Liz – a lovely few days and the campsite at Cheltenham Race Course is pretty spectacular….. might need to come back for a race day if we can get a spot.

We have been keeping ourselves busy doing a little ‘Fungi’ hunting… well more specifically, we signed up to a Mushroom foraging course over a period of four Sundays during October and November. We had been talking about doing a foraging course for a little while but a few weeks ago we found a beautiful Giant Puff Ball mushroom which kicked me into gear of searching something out to give us a little more ‘shroom’ knowledge.

We have completed two of the four foraging courses, the third one taking place this week and each one is incredible. The amount of information and variety of funghi that are out there and when you start looking – you need to walk slowly and adjust your eyes – there are hundreds of them out there of all different shapes, sizes and colours…. it is mind blowing!

The above are only a selection of what we have found both whilst on the course and also whilst out walking since…. so far we haven’t actually gained the confidence to eat any of the ones we have found on our own…. I think its one of those situations where the more you know, the more your fear…. and yes, the first one on the second row down was a ‘Dog Stinkhorn’… better known as a dogs willy.

The last couple of months have gone quickly. Keith has been playing a support role to his mum who had a hip operation mid September – or actually more so for Molly, the dog as she needed walking – so we have been keeping a low profile whilst experimenting a little more with cooking and some lovely eateries.

I’m only mentioning a couple of favourites as there have been a few over the last few months. The first being The Beehive in White Waltham, where we have been before and this time we took Keiths mum for a birthday pre-op lunch….. and the broccoli and stilton soup was to die for.

…and the second also a second visit but this time to The Greyhound in Beaconsfield for lunch. It was as exceptional as the dinner we had previously as well as the tasting menu that we have had a Loch & Tyne (and yes, we have been back there too) …can’t ever have too much of a good thing!

Believe it or not, the following was a three course set lunch menu but they just kept coming with the delicious additions in between courses…. including a pre-dessert of scones and clotted cream!

Now with the exciting, exceptionally beautifully presented food over I can show you some of the new recipes that we have been trying…. although I possibly should have put these first as they look fairly disappointing after the above.

Can you tell that we have been watching Nadiya’s Spice series…..

– Courgette and Chickpea Curry
– Smokey Aubergine Deep Pan Pizza – Taking the base of one of Nadiya’s recipes with what appeared to be an odd flavour combination but was actually really delicious with a warm touch of spice
– Brown Lentil Dhal – another quick and easy Nadiya recipe
– Cauliflower and Red Lentil Curry – A lovely, lightly spiced curry which is really simple to make
– Tuna Bhuna – It was supposed to be crab as per Nadiya’s recipe but they didn’t have any, so I switched to Tuna and although Crab is more delicate, the tuna works well too
– Green Tomato Tarte – with a random, self planted tomato plant giving a really good quantity of fruit we felt the need to make use of them and this recipe delivers on flavour and ease
– Spicy Mexican Tomato Tarte – when the Green tomatos ran out I looked for an alternative and is equally as tasty and the cumin in the pastry adds a lovely touch.

…. and now its almost time to hit the road again for a few more adventures before Christmas!