{"id":2807,"date":"2014-04-29T20:41:59","date_gmt":"2014-04-29T19:41:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/?p=2807"},"modified":"2026-05-23T09:07:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T08:07:11","slug":"alone-again-with-eileen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/2014\/04\/29\/alone-again-with-eileen\/","title":{"rendered":"Alone Again With Eileen"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dartmouth\"
Dartmouth<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Dartmouth campsite gave us our first night alone in Eileen this year; no more packing up bags and borrowing beds for a long while.\u00a0 We dined on delicious venison and cranberry pie at the Green Dragon pub in Stoke Fleming and then walked back to the campsite with bellies full to bursting.\u00a0 After a good night\u2019s sleep, we walked down to the South West Coastal Path and followed it around the headland to Dartmouth Castle and on in to Dartmouth town.\u00a0 It was a beautiful walk with lovely views down on tiny rocky coves and out over the chilly looking sea.\u00a0 To the left of us, we passed grassy green fields, yellow rape fields and brown freshly ploughed fields.\u00a0 Beside us, trees covered in blossom, bluebells, whitebells, daffodils, primroses, cowslips and hedgerows full of so very many flowers; all confirmed that this really is a lovely time of year to be strolling the countryside of England.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"On
On the South West Coastal Path to Dartmouth<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Amongst
Amongst the bluebells on the South West Coastal Path<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

In Dartmouth we bought a book by the artist Simon Drew, in fact we actually bought the book from<\/strong> the artist, Simon Drew.\u00a0 I\u2019ve always loved his humorous pictures, so it was rather nice to be able to stop for a chat with him.\u00a0 Amusingly, when I asked how the Queen felt about his sketches of her, he answered \u201cI don\u2019t know, I\u2019ve never actually asked her permission\u201d\u2026\u2026…\u00a0 www.simondrew.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Dartmouth
Dartmouth Castle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Window
Window shopping in Foss Street, Dartmouth<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

After indulging in a Devonshire cream tea, we caught the bus back to the campsite and spent the night rocking and rolling in high winds and pouring rain, it felt like we were on a boat in stormy seas.\u00a0 I was flippin\u2019 glad we weren\u2019t crossing the Bay of Biscay that night!!!<\/p>\n

\"Cream
Cream tea mmmmmm<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

On Saturday, with the weather clearing\u2026..a bit\u2026., we caught the bus back in to Dartmouth and bought tickets for a \u2018Round Robin Trip\u2019.\u00a0 Concession tickets!!!\u00a0 When asked if we were over 60, we said that Rodney was, but I obviously looked awful that day, because I was sold a concession ticket too!!!\u00a0 \u00a0Ah well, I guess there\u2019s nothing wrong with saving money.\u00a0 We climbed on board the ‘MV Cardiff Castle’ and spent 1 \u00bd hours cruising up the River Dart, passing \u2018Greenways\u2019, the home of writer, Agatha Christie, and a reputedly 1,000-year-old yew tree which stands beside the church in Stoke Gabriel.<\/p>\n

\"On
On board the MV Cardiff Castle cruising up the Dart River<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

We had an hour available to stroll around Totnes and we decided that it felt like a cute, English version of Nimbin in Australia, a very alternative, hippy town; I haven\u2019t seen that many dreadlocks and rainbow clothing in a long time.\u00a0 Another bus ride took us over the headland to Paignton, a pretty awful town full of closed down shops, glaring penny arcades and noisy amusement halls.\u00a0 We opted for warming cups of tea in the railway station caf\u00e9, away from all of the inflatable dolphins and plastic paraphernalia.<\/p>\n

\"East
East Gate, Totnes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

At 4:15pm we caught the steam train, the Great Western Hercules no. 4277 to Kingswear.\u00a0 This really was a lovely train, a proper train, and we paid extra to sit on a comfy sofa in the Devon Belle observation car at the rear of the train; definitely the way to travel in style.\u00a0 It was just a shame that the clouds started to leak. \u00a0All day the clouds had looked full and desperate to burst, which they finally did….. before we got off the train.\u00a0 By the time we arrived at Kingswear station, it was bucketing down and dashing to the ferry was a rather wet affair.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t pleasant getting soaked but at least we were wearing raincoats.\u00a0 Our fellow passengers were a bride, a groom, bridesmaids and their whole wedding party.\u00a0 Sadly, they were all dressed for a sunny summer\u2019s afternoon.\u00a0 Hats were soggy, hairstyles were ruined, the bride looked frozen and the bouquet was definitely overwatered.\u00a0 I felt so sorry for them, but they all seemed to be having a good laugh and enjoying themselves.\u00a0 As they dashed for a local hotel, we managed to squeeze ourselves in to a covered bus shelter for the last bus back to the campsite.\u00a0 So that was bus, boat, bus, train, boat, bus, done!<\/p>\n

\"Travelling
Travelling in style<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Early on Sunday morning, we drove, via a rather circuitous route avoiding a half marathon event, in to the city of Plymouth.\u00a0 With rain still coming down, by the time we drove onto the ferry, we were really hoping that the ship would take us to a sunnier climate in Spain.\u00a0 Our fingers and toes were well and truly crossed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Watching
Watching the big boys boarding the MV Pont Aven<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Passing
Passing Plymouth outer breakwater lighthouse<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

On board the MV Pont Aven, I remarked that our cabin was rather small, but then on reflection I realised that it was a lot larger than inside Eileen and the bathroom was definitely more spacious.\u00a0 We whiled away a couple of hours watching the movie \u2018Grand Budapest Hotel\u2019 while our seats rolled from side to side and a little bit up and down.\u00a0 It was rather disconcerting to start with, but the movie was lovely and I soon tuned into the weird rocking sensation.\u00a0 Afterwards we wobbled our way to the bar and enjoyed a drink, while a magician was trying to entertain the only three children on board.\u00a0 But when the bingo started up, we decided it was definitely time to hole up in our cabin and get some sleep.\u00a0 Having a shower was an active, hang on to the handle experience and invoked a fair amount of giggles from me, but salty old seadog, Rodney, was right at home and found my reaction bizarre.\u00a0 We slept pretty well in our rolling beds, far better than I ever manage on an airplane, but it was nice to arrive in Santander after twenty hours at sea, and drive Eileen down the ramps on to Spanish soil.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"On
On board the Pont Aven<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Dartmouth campsite gave us our first night alone in Eileen this year; no more packing up bags and borrowing beds for a long while.\u00a0 We dined on delicious venison and cranberry pie at the Green Dragon pub in Stoke Fleming and then walked back to the campsite with bellies full to bursting.\u00a0 After a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2812,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-on-the-road-in-great-britain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2807"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2807\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8343,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2807\/revisions\/8343"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}