I enjoyed a lie in til about 930am as did Davies. Ady and Scarlett had been doing some hand washing of the last of our dirty clothes which led to some amusing spin drying before we hung them out 🙂
” alt=”” />
Davies’ hair has been getting ever more unruly so I took to it with the scissors and you can now see his face and he can see out again 🙂
” alt=”” />
Then we headed off into Bangor. We were determined to spend a Millets voucher that Ady had been given from his work as a leaving present so were pleased to find they had a sale on. We still rather struggled to find things we actually wanted but got a pair of trousers for Ady, a top for me, a communal jumer that fits both Ady and I and hats for all four of us. We picked up a birthday card for my Mum which I need to post tomorrow and then walked to the pier, calling in on charity shops as we went.
We walked past a very random bloke walking backwards up and down the seafront. We watched him for a while but got quite freaked out by him – it was a stretch of road at the bottom of a fairly rough feeling road with two very loud women swigging vodka out the bottle on the corner. I googled ‘walking backwards Bangor’ when we got home and found someone else had videoed him a few weeks ago and put it on youtube which entertained us greatly!
We wanted to visit Bangor pier as we had been there years ago when the kids were tiny and we stayed in Bangor the night before getting a ferry to Ireland, so the plan was to get the photo updated 🙂
January 2004
” alt=”” />
July 2011
” alt=”” />
We walked to the end – it’s the only pier I have ever had to pay to get on to, only £1.30 for all of us but still very random to pay to enter – and had an ice cream. I particularly liked the fact that the slats of the pier continued into the loos, so I could have a wee while still looking through the gaps at the sea 🙂
Then we turned round and walked all the way back again! We went via Millets again as we had decided to spend the remainder of the voucher on two chairs. We started off not taking chairs with us and bringing four tiny fold up stools but quickly realised they are no good for relaxing on outside the van and bought two chairs a while ago but had decided to get two more so we all had one as we think they justify their space in the van.
We got almost all the way back and were really flagging on the final half mile when Lisa and John’s neighbour Ian pulled up in his van and offered us as lift the rest of the way. We jumped at the chance so scrambled in the back. It’s a shame we didn’t get to spend more time with Ian as he is really interesting. He squatted here on this land 40 years ago and learnt his tree pruning, grafting and growing trade before heading to Canada where he made loads of money and was able to come back and buy the land along with a couple of houses which he lets out. He lives in the coolest log cabin (two storey) which he got retrospective planning permission for and then jacked the house up with car jacks from B&Q in order to get the height 😆 He has a pond which the kids did some dipping in with two rafts floating on the surface which looked great fun to leap from one to the next and back out again but I left to the children as I could see if was beyond me 😉
Back to the static for a cup of tea and sit down. Ady washed Willow and then we were showing the kids the Day trip to Bangor song on youtube when Lisa arrived and stayed for a chat.
John came home and we all headed off – they took both their cars so they could give us a lift, into town to a Greek Taverna where they were treating us to a meal and to see their friend, a storyteller who was singing some of his own songs this evening. We met him briefly beforehand and were sitting eating when he came on. He has a fantastic voice, really strong and pure and was singing some great songs about rubbish, waste, not trashing the world and so on which the kids and I were really enjoying. I leant over to ask Lisa what his name was so I could look him up later and she said ‘Eric Maddern’. When I explained he was one of our favourite authors she said ‘oh yes, I’d forgotten he writes childrens books too’ :).
Davies and I went to sit down next to his wife and watch the rest of his set and then I thanked him for his books which have given us such pleasure and said it was so great to meet him. He gave the kids a cuddle and we had our picture taken with him.
” alt=”” />
He invited us to his home / camp to stay but we explained we are heading off tomorrow. Another time though most definitely 🙂 Still rather starstruck to have met him really 🙂
We got back about 1130 and D & S went straight to bed. Ady and I shared a cider and are now utterly worn out so are also off to bed.