Finally On Our Way

Well the journey begins. We picked up Aurora in Elland, near Halifax in Yorkshire. We spent the first few days around the areas in case of any teething problems and to provision the van for our trip. The weather has been cold in some places bitterly due to the wind chill but there has been no rain or snow falls since we left Dal and Renata in London.

Our first real camping stop was in Sheffield in Sherwood Forrest. The trip down from Elland was eventful with Honey, the fickle female who resides somewhere in our SatNav, taking us via every perilously narrow, pot hole ridden, stone wall lined, snow drifted country lane in the Midlands.

There is still a lot of snow on the ground even in the low lying countryside. It is still banked up along the drywall fence lines and the road verge where it has been ploughed. You can see that some of the drifts were at least six foot high and in some places even higher.

We only stayed one night in Sherwood as the Robin Hood spirit had infested the camping ground with the price being truly daylight robbery. It was called Clumber Park but should have been called Robber's Rest. We spent the next night just west of Sheffield at an outstanding little pub that caters for Motorhomers. The Three Merry Lads sits on a ridge at the edge of the Peaks District. The price was £8 for the night or nothing if you had a meal at the pub. We ate three nights worth but it was one of the best pub meals you could ask for. They even made Margie four Yorkshire Puddings even though it wasn't Roast Day. And they supplied Aurora with free electricity for the night.

The morning dawned bright, clear and so cold breathing in stung your nose. We headed off across Snake Pass one of the top ten driver's roads in Britain, it winds up a river valley and over the top of the moors of the Peaks District. It features prominently on a lot of Top Gear test drives, which explains why it is now festooned with speed cameras. It is also one of the worst roads for motorcycle fatalities in Britain, due to too many weekend world champ wannabes. We passed through Glossop, where we met Maddi's double outside our favorite coffee shop Costa's. Margie got lots of lovin. We then skirted Manchester and headed southwest into Wales.

We are now camped in a quiet little camping ground in the small town of Chirk. It noted for Chirk Castle which has out outstanding gardens. There is also the Chirk Aqueduct which is part of the inland canal system. We cycled across the aqueduct and along the tow path to a nice little pub called The Poacher. After sampling the local brew we cycled back to our little home as Margie calls it. On Sunday we rode along the tow path the other way to Pontcysyllte and across an even higher aqueduct. We had coffee and apple pie and tried to warm up after our ride at the lockside pub The Telford Arms.

The ride was sheltered in the hollow the canal runs through but the wind was vicious as we crossed the aqueduct. Our new bike performed very well except for the puncture I got on the way back to the campground.

We head off today for even more snow in Snowdonia National Park and then on to Anglesey.