Rock Pooling at Shell Island.

Mine and Ed's latest adventure was to Shell Island over the bank holiday weekend. And it was the worst camping expedition we have had yet! The camp site on Shell Island boasts that it is the largest in Europe and they do not allocate pitches, but unfortunately that is where the positives end. The facilities were really dirty, it was one of those places where you are hyper-vigilant that no part of your trouser legs sweep the floor when approaching the porcelain thrown! The toilet paper also ran out frequently, the washing up area was strewn with icky food scraps, and the Magnum ice creams cost £1.80 each! It was god awful. Not only that but the camp site seemed to be full of boy racers and wife beater top wearing, scary dog owners (you get my drift). It was one of those camp sites where I felt a little uncomfortable leaving my few valuables, I travel with, stowed away in Doris. 

The weather reflected my mood, and was grey and rainy nearly the whole time we were there. Ed and I had planned to stay for 3 nights, but we decided to cut our losses after 2. On chatting to some other campervaners there are stories of riot vans and shootings at this camp site in the past! So if for some reason you are tempted by camping at Shell Island, just keep in mind that Ed rebranded this place Hell Island. 

The only up side to this whole camping fiasco was that there are some super cool rock pools at this place (if you can try and ignore the litter strewn at the edge of the beech). I haven't been rock pooling for a really long time so I was excited. I had such a fun time it didn't even upset me when Ed broke my net after about 10 minutes of him using it (I think this camping trip was slightly doomed).  

Ed and I caught shrimps mainly, we found a crab trying to hide in the sand, I saved a starfish that had managed to get washed onto the beech upside down and we spotted loads of sea anemones, which are one of my favourite creatures ever! It was Ed's first time seeing them in the wild, so it was a pretty awesome few hours spent amongst the rocks and the sea water. It started to rain again so we headed back to Doris to drink tea and play iPad scrabble. Here is to the next more successful camping trip!

Hope you had enjoyable bank holiday adventures! 

Much Love.

Kirst x  

Farewell 2013, Thanks for all the Memories.

I thought I would shake together a montage of what 2013 has blessed me with. So many gorgeous memories. Sometimes at the end of the year I sit down and wonder what I have done and achieved, but blogging really helps me piece together all the 365 days. Some of my favourite adventures included: buying Doris & Libertea Belle, free arty gin, bike riding, getting the pigs, picnics, quaffing beer, alotmenting and visiting many National Trust properties. 

Happy New Years Eve all you lovely readers. Thanks for perusing over my blog this past year. I hope you all have a wonderful night full of fun, memories and sparks of excitement for 2014. Here is to many more adventures, journeys and love. 

Much Love and see you in 2014 <3

Kirst xXx 

Sherwood Mycology - Part 1

It has been nearly a month since I had my lovely holiday in Sherwood Pines with Ed and my folks, the time has absolutely flown by with all the Christmas shopping and early dark nights. I am really looking forward to the shortest day because then it is the count down to long, warm summery nights camping in Doris. 

On our little holiday we went on an excursion to Sherwood Forest, the weather was beautiful, wintery and crisp and I had such a fun time snapping all this lovely fungus. I can only identify the first two though (I think), the first one is Trametes Versicolor which has a nickname of Turkey Tail which I think is very apt. The second one down is Ascocoryne Sarcoides which is also known as the Purple Jellydisk, I think it should be called Purple Brain! 

When I looked in my mushroom book I could kinda find some similar matches for the others, but none I was really sure about. I couldn't find out what the red, rusty one that was nestled into the bark, was at all though. If anyone knows what any of these are then please leave a comment below, I would love to hear from you. This was such a fun trip out, I can't wait to get out with my camera again.

Hope all your Christmas plans are coming together <3

Much Love,

Kirst xXx 

Holiday Memories to Warm the Cockles.

After scanning the weather forecast for most of last week Ed and I decided we could squeeze in a camping trip to Wells next to the Sea, at the weekend. We were so lucky with the weather, it rained going there, rained coming home but the rest of our stay was full of sunshine. 

We went for a drink in a couple of our favourite pubs on Friday night then snuggled under the duvet in Doris and watched a film. On Saturday we went crabbing, the first dunk of the bait net we had a huge starfish munching on it! Obviously it fell off when we pulled the net up, which was a good thing really because we had only brought a small bucket, I'm not sure if one of his legs could have fitted in. Then on Sunday we raced Ed's RC trucks on the beach, which was pretty cool. He only lets me play with his cheapest ones though because he thinks I'm too rough! 

The second to last picture is the view out of the back of Doris on Saturday evening, you can see the pop top of another T25 just over the hedge. There were 4 T25s all in the corner of the camp site, which meant that Doris had plenty of company hehe. It was such a lovely weekend, it is hard to believe how warm and summery it was when this week has been  so chilly and rainy. 

Hope you have enjoyed the last few fragments of summer <3

Much Love

Kirst 

Journeying up Mount Doom in Doris.

There is nothing I love better on a rainy evening than looking at all the random photos that I took on our last camping trip. I forgot I had taken all these until Ed reminded me yesterday. He was a little bit disappointed that I didn't take any pictures of our 20% gradient hill accent! He then just teased me that I was too scared to think about anything else whilst we were doing it. I must admit when the hill loomed in the window I did hold my breath slightly. It was steep and we had never done anything like that before, so all that was left to do was Ed to put her in second gear and then we prayed whilst she slowly journeyed to the top! Frodo climbing up Mount Doom had nothing on us.  

Every journey is super fun in Doris, especially now I have got used to all the mechanical noises she makes, the first long trip I got Ed to explain what all the noises were because some of them were a bit scary. And when we get to our destination it feels so awesome.

We are already planning our next trip, just can't wait!!

Much Love.

xkx 

Doris' First Trip to Wales (with Us).

You may have noticed that I haven't been around a lot this week, well I have still been getting over my gluten episode and we had to get ready for our camping trip mid week. Ed and I decided to go to Wales and my folks came with us and brought their tent. This was the longest trip we have taken Doris on. We did the first part on Wednesday evening, Nottingham to Shropshire which was is about 90 miles, then on Thursday we did the rest which was close to 100 miles because we took the scenic route. The weather was beautiful and this was the view we had from Doris in the evening. 

This was probably the best camping trip we have had so far, it was so much fun and we even caught up with my aunt and uncle which I haven't seen for years. Doris was very well behaved and the slight issue we had with her cutting out when coming to a stop was fixed when Ed tightened up a loose part of the carburettor. We are already planning out next couple of trips! 

Hope you have had an awesome week and bank holiday weekend <3

Much Love.

xkx 

Post Camping Blues.

I am missing camping sooo much! It was a perfect weekend and one of my favourite things was going to sleep staring at the stars out of the back window, life doesn't really get much better than that for me. I am still impressed with how cosy Doris is inside, when the bed is made up in the back it is my version of heaven! 

Hope you had a lovely bank holiday weekend and managed to soak up a bit of that much needed sun. We have another camping trip planned in a couple of weeks and I am super excited <3

Much Love
xkx

Doris' Maiden Voyage!

Ed and I set off on our maiden voyage in Doris on Friday, we were a little bit nervous as this was the first big trip we had ever done in her. Ed has worked so hard on Doris since we got her in January, she was in really good condition for a 30 year old van but there were plenty of niggles that needed ironing out. We couldn't have wished for a more perfect weekend, the weather was absolutely stunning and Doris was super comfortable, it has definitely given us wanderlust. 

We went to Wells-next-the-Sea, it is a popular sea side resort on the East coast of the UK. Wells is one of my favourite places in the whole world, for me it has everything a sea side resort could have to offer, beautiful beaches, a quaint harbour, places to go crabbing and amazing local food shops. We found a little Deli in the town called Wells Deli, I had a Laksa there, it was one of the best I have ever had AND it was only £4.25! We did a lot of cooking in Doris because the local produce in Norfolk is second to non in my opinion. The local butchers even cured their own bacon... treacle bacon! I discovered there are few things better in life than fried, treacle bacon in gluten free granary bread. 

Saturday night was pretty epic, we found this boat called The Albatros which has been converted to a bar and has live music over the weekend. This was probably the coolest venue I have ever been to, it has a well worn, comfortable, shabby chic style to it with real ale! It has even made it into the CAMRA Good Beer Guide. The live music was a mixture of blues and americana and this little venue rocks when the guitars start up. I think this will be a regular haunt for Ed and I when we are camping in Wells. 

What a great weekend, 220 miles under our belts and many more to go, I'm missing camping already.

Hope you have had a lovely weekend <3 

xkx

Holidays from the Past - Vintage Postcards.

Spring has sprung, it is so close to camping season I can actually smell the damp grass and the cooking gas. So with that in mind here are the second couple of vintage postcards from my modest collection. The first post card is one of my favourites, it is just sooo pretty. 

Hope you have enjoyed taking a peek at these little fragments of people's lives. They just make me want to go on holiday. 

Hope you have got some wicked plans for the weekend looming. 

xkx

Doris' Get Ready for Camping List.

Ed and I are hoping to be able to take Doris (our T25 VW campervan) out for our first camping trip together very soon. I am so excited, I just can't wait to go to the seaside in her  read books, have adventures and relax. As I love lists so much I decided to scribble one up to get Ed and I focussed on some of the things we will have to aquire before the first camping trip. We really don't need that much as we have been collecting treasure for her even before we bought her.

So far we have a collection of vintage and new melamine plates and cups. I refused to drink any hot liquid out of the old melamine because I was scared of weird chemicals zapping into my drink (I'm not sure this fear is founded on real fact or not). So I bought Ed the tin VW mug ages ago and Ed bought me my tin camping mug today! It was in the sale at Paperchase and I thought it was super cute. I bought three cushion covers from a charity shop absolutely ages ago and I just never found a proper use for them so I have decided I am going to throw them in the wash and get them customised so they can live in Doris. Its one of my beliefs that you can never have too many cushions (Ed doesn't like them too much though hehe). 

Have you got any trips you are itching to start?

xkx