LEE PAYNE

Tag: mum

  • Going underground – my July 2023 holiday (part 2)

    Going underground – my July 2023 holiday (part 2)

    It’s what literally no one has been waiting for! Part 2 of my write-up of my holiday in Wales. If you haven’t read part 1, click here to get up to speed with Barry Island, Chepstow and Hopwood Park Services.

    Day 3 – Wednesday 19th July

    Wednesday was mum’s birthday, so the morning involved her opening her cards (I now have a five year streak of producing tears with mine) and presents (the Garmin fitness tracker, a joint gift from me and Dave, was well received). But we didn’t have much time for that, as we had to be on the train fairly early again. We were heading back into England – we were going to Bristol.

    The trip to Bristol obviously involves crossing the River Severn again, and on the train it means going underneath it via the Severn Tunnel, not something that mum enjoyed. Anyway, it was quite a short journey and we arrived in one of England’s great cities.

    I had never been to Bristol, but read and heard much about it. This was Brunel country, a big city that somehow doesn’t have a top flight football team, and also where a lot of scenes from my favourite sitcom Only Fools and Horses were filmed once it had become too popular to be shot in London. It was exciting to be able to tick off another metropolis.

    Unfortunately, we had not planned for our visit to Bristol beyond buying the train tickets, and so on arrival we had no idea where we going or what we were going to do. We walked away from the enormous Temple Meads station and, as it turned out, went the wrong way and ended up in a rough part of town.

    Temple Meads station in Bristol

    Mum said she wanted a coffee, so I used my phone to find us a place with good reviews not far away. We discovered that this place, Bakehouse, was on an industrial estate. The coffee was ok, the food looked nice but went untried due to how expensive it was, and we found ourselves in the bizarre situation of sitting on a picnic bench amongst industrial units. Only two days before we had been enjoying the spectacular views on Barry Island.

    We resolved to find the city centre, and eventually managed it. We went into a few shops and had a nice lunch in a café, but we never saw any of Bristol’s great sights. We didn’t see the SS Great Britain, we didn’t see the Clifton Suspension Bridge, and I didn’t tick off any more sporting venues such as Ashton Gate, the Memorial Stadium or the County Ground. We went to catch the train feeling like we hadn’t really ‘done’ Bristol, and I feel like I need to return at some point.

    Day 4 – Thursday 20th July

    There was a train strike on Thursday, so we spent the day off the rails, as it were. We walked to Caldicot Castle, not far from our apartment, and were very pleasantly surprised by the experience. It was free to get in, which was unexpected, and there are so many little nooks and crannies of this historic site to explore. A Grade I listed building, most of what we can see today was built somewhere around 1170 and restored in that confident Victorian way by a man called Joseph Richard Cobb, who made it his family home.

    What really interested me was the fact that the castle was used to house families who had been bombed out during the Second World War. Down one very narrow corridor was a bath that would have been used by people living there in the 1940s.

    Extensive helical staircases would take us down to the basement, where a grate allowed us to peer into the darkness of the dungeons, and up to the top of the tower, where we enjoyed wonderful views over the Severn Estuary – very much a photo opportunity.

    The view from the top of Caldicot Castle, with the Severn Bridge in the background

    We enjoyed a snack and a drink from the castle’s tea room before we left. A truly wonderful place, a fantastic thing for the locals to have on their doorstep. The field next to the castle is used for concerts – Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds are performing there in August.

    Day 5 – Friday 21st July

    Our last full day in Wales. We had heard about a place called Dewstow Gardens & Grottoes, which was only about ten minutes away from the apartment by car, so we went there to take a look.

    Honestly, if you are ever out that way you must go to Dewstow Gardens & Grottoes. The gardens at ground level are beautiful and incredibly well-maintained, with so many trees, plants and ponds to sit by and enjoy some peace and quiet. But it is when you go underground, into the network of tunnels that go through the stone, that your mind is truly blown. These grottoes are amazing spaces – they really are like stepping into another world.

    Even better, when I was enjoying a delicious sausage roll and slice of chocolate cake from the café, little birds like to sit on the tables and eat the crumbs that people have left behind. Look at this chap.

    We didn’t really have a plan for what to do after we’d left Dewstow, and in an unexpected turn of events we ended up crossing back into England and stopping at Severn View Services. As the name suggests, this is where a short walk will give you the best possible view of the Severn Bridge.

    Increasingly weary, next we found ourselves back in Chepstow, but with very little energy left in the tank we didn’t do anything other than visit a Wetherspoons for a meal. I had a pizza (and no, I’m not getting any thinner).

    We were knackered, but content. We’d seen so many new places and done so much walking that we knew our holiday in Wales was one we would never forget.

    Day 6 – Saturday 22nd July

    Time to go home. With the forecast suggesting that a month’s worth of rain in one day would leave Wales looking something like Atlantis before long, we left as early as we could. I put my head down for a nap just after we’d crossed the bridge back into England, and when I woke up we were driving around the suburbs of Reading, which was a surprise as no part of our journey home should have involved the suburbs of Reading.

    Apparently, they had said on the radio that there was traffic on the M25 at Slough. This was exactly the part of the M25 we needed to go on, so Dave had made the decision to try to avoid the M25. Well, to say this meant we went home the long way round is an understatement. We must be the only people ever to travel between Wales and Norfolk and stop for a wee at the Tesco in Amersham, Buckinghamshire. After we’d been there I swapped with mum and sat in the front seat to help guide us in the right direction. We took in Chesham, Hemel Hempstead and St Albans but eventually made it to the A14 near Cambridge and back to dear old Dereham.

    If you’ve made it down this far, thank you very much for reading. Hopefully I’ve inspired you to go exploring. Whatever you do, make sure you visit Dewstow Gardens & Grottoes!

  • A Wales of a time – my July 2023 holiday (part 1)

    I was on holiday in Wales last week!

    It was the first time I’d been out that way, and it was a nice change from heading to the Yorkshire/Derbyshire area, which I had been doing most summers since I was a child – including last year.

    I kept a diary of the six day trip, so here’s what we (my mum, step-dad and I) got up to:

    Day 1 – Sunday 16th July

    Departure day. It wasn’t just us going on holiday – our budgie, Messy, was spending the week at Dave’s brother’s house, and he’d been taken there on the Saturday night. We had said we wanted to be on the road by 8am, so of course we left shortly after 9am.

    I had taken a travel sickness tablet, and tried to get some sleep on the journey. I put my head down somewhere near Thetford and when I woke up we were just to the south of Birmingham! We stopped for a break at Hopwood Park Services and then completed a pretty smooth journey by crossing the Prince of Wales Bridge into Wales.

    Crossing the Prince of Wales Bridge into Wales

    We were staying in an Airbnb in Caldicot, a small town near Chepstow. This was the first time we’d used Airbnb and first impressions were good. Our accommodation was a self-contained apartment attached to the owners’ house.

    That evening we walked to find the railway station and explore the town.

    Day 2 – Monday 17th July

    With the weather forecast good for our first full day in Wales, we decided to go to Cardiff on the train. But once we’d arrived at Cardiff Central Station, we decided to carry on to the coast at Barry Island. This was, of course, where a lot of the sitcom Gavin and Stacey was filmed, as well as a few scenes from my favourite film Submarine.

    I have to say I wasn’t expecting Barry Island to be quite so beautiful. The beach is huge, and with the sun shining the water sparkled and you could see Weston-Super-Mare on the other side. We stopped at a café on the sea front before walking to the end of Friars Point, where the heavens opened and we got soaked.

    Enjoying my summer holiday

    Making our way back, we had lunch at a fish and chip shop next door to Marco’s Cafe, the real life place that Stacey works at in Gavin and Stacey. It’s clear that Barry Island is very proud of its association with the hugely successful BBC show – there are murals celebrating the fact all over the place, and the shops are not short of mugs emblazoned with Nessa’s catchphrase ‘oh, what’s occurring?’ or t-shirts with ‘sugar tits’ printed on them, the ‘affectionate’ nickname Dave Coaches used for Nessa.

    A game of adventure golf and a drink sitting outside a pub followed before we headed to the station, but the day wasn’t over. I like ticking off any sporting arenas I see on my travels, and Cardiff has several. Not far from Cardiff Central I was able to see the Principality (formerly Millennium) Stadium, the home of the Welsh rugby union team, although we couldn’t get too close to it due to some work being done. I did take this photo though.

    The cricket ground, named Sophia Gardens after the park that is close to it, is a bit of a walk from the Principality but we made the effort and were rewarded when we were told by a steward that we were welcome to go in and watch the end of a women’s match that was going on.

    I can now add Sophia Gardens to the list of cricket grounds I’ve seen a match at: Lord’s, Trent Bridge, Headingley, Old Trafford and Edgbaston.

    When the match was over, we were on our way back to the station when we realised that the next train back to Caldicot wasn’t until 7.50pm! So we had dinner at a Wetherspoons around the corner to kill the time. We were pleased we did, as it was in a fascinating old building – a theatre that was the venue for the first performance of the Welsh National Opera.

    Reaching our apartment just before 9pm, we were all shattered. Our first full day would turn out to be our longest!

    Day 2 – Tuesday 18th July

    After the events of Monday, a quieter day was mooted for Tuesday. We walked into the town to see the market, which turned out to be about four stalls. The most noteworthy event that morning was a man tripping on a raised bit of paving and going down in instalments, hitting the ground chin first. Dave, a trained first aider, rushed to help. The response was actually quite heart warming – a chair was brought over from a nearby restaurant, a first aid kit was procured from a betting shop, and an off-duty nurse took over. As we were leaving, the police (or ‘heddlu’ as they are known in the utterly impenetrable Welsh language) were just arriving to see what was going on.

    We got in the car and went to Chepstow, which is only 5 miles or so away. The only thing I really knew about Chepstow before arriving was that they did horse racing there, but it’s actually a really interesting town with plenty of history. Here’s a photo of Chepstow Bridge, where you can actually walk between Wales and England.

    Chepstow Bridge from the Welsh side

    I’ll be writing about the rest of my trip to Wales in the next few days – I hope you’ll come back for part 2!

  • 10 of my favourite photos that I’ve got on my phone

    10 of my favourite photos that I’ve got on my phone

    Most of us have had a camera phone for quite a while now, with hundreds if not thousands of photos taken over the years. I’ve scrolled through mine and picked out ten that have a story behind them.

    1st November 2010 – Dad

    I have told the story about my dad more than once, but in short, he died in 2014 at the age of 69 having been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease six years previously. It’s nice to have this photo on my phone. Dad is in his sheltered housing flat here, on the sofa where we drank bucketloads of tea and watched countless football matches. His cheeky grin is showing off the false tooth he wore. The story goes that it was knocked out by a cricket ball during a match on the playing fields of what is now the Hewett School when he was a young lad.

    1st June 2020 – seeing family for the first time since lockdown

    I think for many of us it was a bit of a shock to go into total lockdown in March 2020. Never before had we faced so many restrictions on our lives, but then it had been a hundred years since the last pandemic of Covid’s scale. It wasn’t until June that the restrictions had been eased enough for me to go and see my mum and her other half Dave (aka Stephen to me). It was strictly outdoors only though – thankfully the weather was lovely. This was also Dave’s birthday and the day my mum presented him with the papers showing that she’d legally changed her surname to his.

    20th July 2021 – sunset at Old Trafford, Manchester

    This was taken at Old Trafford cricket ground as the sun set on a red hot July day in Manchester. The match between England and Pakistan turned out to be the first sporting event to be played in front of a capacity crowd since the pandemic began. England won.

    28th November 2021 – my last day at Sainsbury’s Queens Road

    My first, and so far only, job was at Sainsbury’s and for eleven years Queens Road was all I knew. Then an opportunity came up to move to the Pound Lane store and, despite the terrifying prospect of having to meet a load of new people, I took it. I was blown away by the send-off my friends and colleagues gave me. This was taken on the Sunday, my last day at Queens, before I started at Pound Lane two days later.

    21st January 2022 – Oscar

    My friend Katie’s dog and without a doubt the best boy in the world. On this particular walk on the old railway line near Aylsham I managed to capture the moment he looked at the camera and I’m rather fond of it.

    28th February 2022 – the end of self-isolating with Covid

    Having avoided Covid throughout the lockdowns it finally caught up with me early last year. At the time I was living in a house where my bedroom had an en suite bathroom so I remained in that room for the entirity of my self-isolation, with food being left outside the door. Being stuck within those four walls for over a week was really tough. I took this photo just as I was about to leave the room for the first time. I can remember the feeling of excitement and relief.

    23rd April 2022 – before a Norwich match at Carrow Road

    With mum and Dave before Norwich’s match against Newcastle last year. Our pre-match ritual tends to involve buying pasties from Morrisons and sitting on that wall before going into the ground. Norwich were thrashed 3-0.

    9th June 2022 – The Killers gig at Carrow Road

    The tickets to see The Killers at Carrow Road were actually given to me as a Christmas present in 2019, with the gig due to take place in June 2020. For obvious reasons it was postponed twice before we finally got to see them in June last year. It is rare to have a band as big as The Killers performing in Norwich and they put on a fantastic show, with one of my favourite bands Blossoms as the support act. In June this year a dream will come true when my all time heroes Arctic Monkeys will play at Carrow Road. I can’t wait!

    25th August 2022 – my 30th birthday

    There was something about turning 30 that freaked me out. On the day, plans to go on the heritage railway between Dereham and Wymondham were scuppered by thunderstorms. Then all my friends turned up on the doorstep and we had a barbecue. I didn’t think people cared about me enough to do such a thing! It was a lovely evening and, as it turns out, being 30 is a lot like being 29.

    15th March 2023 – sunrise from my hotel room window in Cromer

    A recent one, but I must have enjoyed my one night stay in Cromer because I’m feeling nostalgic about something that happened only two weeks ago. I had long wanted to stay at the Cliftonville Hotel, as I thought the building was interesting and I was keen to see what the promise of sea views from every room looked like. I scratched that itch during a week’s holiday from work and had a great time relaxing and getting my head together. This was taken from my hotel room window quite early in the morning, with a stunning sunrise over the town and its famous pier.

    There we have it then, a small selection of photos on my phone that bring a smile to my face. Thanks for reading!

  • A sporting break – my July 2022 trip to Manchester

    My view of England v South Africa, Old Trafford, Manchester, 22nd July 2022

    I’ve been back from my holiday for a week now, but as these things often do, it feels like a lot longer!

    I usually go away around my mum’s birthday (19th July) and this year was no different. In 2021, we stayed in Salford to make it easy to get to Old Trafford for a T20 cricket match between England and Pakistan. On this occasion, we actually stayed in a hotel right in the middle of Manchester.

    The Portland Hotel, Manchester

    My room was on the third floor of the hotel, with mum and her other half Dave a couple of doors down. It was clean and comfortable with a Queen size bed. You could hear the trams rumbling through the city centre, but rather than being irritating it was actually quite a pleasant sound.

    On our first night, we walked across the road into Piccadilly Gardens and found a fan park dedicated to the Women’s Euro 2022. There you could buy merchandise, eat and drink, and watch the matches on a big screen. I had been enjoying the tournament and England had North Walsham’s Lauren Hemp in their squad, so it was fun following the progress of the Norfolk girl. Our first night in Manchester happened to be the night of England’s quarter final against Spain, so we sat in the fan park with hundreds of others and cheered the Lionesses on.

    The fan park in Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens

    England went behind – conceding a goal for the first time in the tournament – but battled back to win 2-1 in extra time. The atmosphere was fantastic and it really made you feel part of the event.

    The moment the final whistle went in the fan park

    The next day, we had booked to go to the National Football Museum. I’d been to the museum a couple of times before, but there is so much to see that there’s no chance you’ll ever see it all. We spent two-and-a-half hours browsing the exhibits, which include the original written laws of the game, the ball used in the 1966 World Cup final and a seat from the original Wembley stadium. Afterwards, we did a bit of shopping. I used to hate buying clothes but these days I actually quite enjoy it.

    The National Football Museum

    Friday was the day of the One Day International between England and South Africa – the reason for our trip up north. Now, cricket is obviously the best sport in the world but, famously, it is at the mercy of the weather. You can’t play cricket in the rain. Not because the players are wimps, but because water and a cork ball wrapped in leather don’t mix. Opening the curtains, I was met with typical Manchester weather – grey skies, damp pavements and drizzly rain.

    Undeterred, we were at the ground when the gates opened at 11am. We were well aware that the game wasn’t going to start at the scheduled time of 1pm. We went to the club shop, we had a drink, and then a chance encounter meant my mum got a photo with England’s star batter Jonny Bairstow!

    Mum and Jonny Bairstow

    At one point we thought the match would be abandoned without a ball being bowled, but the weather did eventually relent for long enough for us to get a game on. Play finally began at 4.45pm, reduced to 29 overs per side from the 50 it was supposed to be. England were sent into bat and I didn’t think they played that well, being bowled out for 201 towards the end. It turned out to be more than enough, however, as South Africa were bowled out for just 83 to give England a win by 118 runs.

    We (literally) squeezed onto a tram to make the 15 minute journey back to our hotel, pleased that we’d seen a match despite the rain and that England had won.

    On Saturday afternoon, after a leisurely breakfast we travelled back to Norfolk in the car. On Sunday, it was back to work…

    When’s my next holiday?