Another day trip to Anstruther

Sometimes we are good at parenting, and other times, we muddle through.

This is a child of ours who looks happy because we have picked her up from University, fed her, and taken her out of St Andrews for the afternoon. 

 

 

 We call her "Eskimo Nell"


We were in Anstruther.  

Last post at the Menin Gate

We were not sure what to expect from our trip to Ypres but we were surprised by the spiders.

 And the cats...

And we found the ceremony very moving. They meet every night to remember. The gate has thousands of names carved on the walls. Everywhere we went we saw thousands of names. All unique.

 

Private W F C Athur - Royal Irish Fusiliers

SPending some time visiting some of the battlefields of the Somme and Vimy ridge, we moved on to find a special gravestone.

We then managed to track down the farm where he was killed, which looked so much like any farm in Scotland. 

One name - amongst the thousands that we read on the other memorials.  

Tin tin was a belgian from Belgium

October holidays - yippee!

After last year's satnav failure we took the same route to Hull, and hopped on the usual ferry.  Not the last car to board this time. Not rushing all the way from the border to the boat.

Instead we travelled like adults, sharing the driving, stopping to buy a gourmet picnic (Tesco - Carlisle), and heading to a town to the west of Brussels... 

Off to Herge town, to hunt down the front-door of the Tintin museum.  Road works not withstanding, and a distinct similarity to cumbernauld, meant the we parked some way away and walked the last bit.

We we treated to many many (many) facts about Herge and his creation, and it was facinating.

Here is Thompson and Thomson in the 2cv.  I think we have this model at home.

We had a great time.

O Canada

The world is getting smaller. No 2 child is off on her studies across the world.

We have a dual time zone in the conservatory, and world time apps on the phones to help keep track of when she might be awake and on the move.

Then we just have to worry about the walking, climbing, hockey, snow-shoeing, travelling, sight-seeing, etc etc.

Back in time - yorkshire style

 Looking a little like something from an episode of Dr Who, we found ourselved in a 1940's weekend once we had finished at the crime writers convention.

We had been on the hunt for a wee craft shop, so this was much better.

Keep dancing!

Leyburn had come alive with about half of the public dressed in 1940's style, with cars, lorries, and stalls all keeping to the theme.

And then back to the caravan to try to set fire to the garlic bread...

Room for a few Moore at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Love these guys.

 And these guys! 

But only one of this pair...

Cabbage white or something else?

Tourism in Yorkshire seems to be a bit over-rated sometimes.  We failed to find the sunday market in one town (because it wasn't on - not because we couldn't find it) and this daytrip was to find a medieval village. 

Hmmm!

The village was a few wooden planks laid out in a grassy field in the shape of the outside of some buildings. Nothing higher than 10 cm

But on the way there we had been accosted by a rambler asking if we had seen a butterfly....

 No - but we saw some cows!