This month Vera was due to spend a lot of time on The M4, A449, M50 and M5. I've had a meeting for work in Brum and Herself and I attended a wedding in Kidderminster just last weekend, before tracking back up here this weekend with the caravan in tow.
If I'm not careful I'll be jabbering like a local saying stuff like "Yam be bawling now if yam don't go up your own end to play" or "That's bostin that is" or "Yow bin tatting or sumat?" while gorging on Faggots and Peas Balti followed by Lardy Cake - washed down with a pint of mild.
Friday 12 October
@DerekTheWeather and his work of fiction have been dominated by the impending hammering that Storm Callum is going to give us. Today has not promised to be pretty at all.
Plan B has been developing in my head all week, as an alternative to the open spaces of the M4 A449 M50 and M5, and as I'm sat at my 2nd floor office window looking out at the howling wind and lashing rain the decision is made to take the slower and more protected route up through mid Wales through Brecon and Hereford.
Herself is questioning my sanity via mid morning texts, but what's the worst that could happen eh?
It would be far easier to say that getting hitched up was trouble free, but that would be a lie. I get home before Herself, and in the howling wind and lashing rain set about getting the van out of the drive.
First job is to drop the security post. Now the padlock has always been a bit of a pig, but I figured that is it's hard for me it's hard for the pikeys. Do you think i could open it? Could I bugger! My efforts resulted in a snapped key in the lock. Yes I swore, I swore a lot.
The next half hour was not pleasant at all. Extension lead dragged round from the shed and placed under the van for protection, and an angle grinder gave the shoot bolt and lock the good news for a full half hour while I lay in a torrent of flood water getting soaked through to the bones.
At least the sparks put on a good show for the bloke opposite who was watching from the comfort of his bay window! Early afternoon, and it's Wagons Roll!
My decision to avoid motorways is confirmed as soon as the wind hits us side on crossing The Loughor and we exit the M4 at J45 and head up the Swansea valley, over Crai into Powys and onto Brecon.
Going is tough, especially over the high ground, but it's still preferable to doing battle with surface spray, side winds and HGVs on the motorway network.
Now I'm not really into this waving to other caravanners thing, but today was different. There were so few of us on the road braving Callum it seemed rude not to. Oh look, another nutter!
Incident free, we're pulling into Chapel Lane 4hrs after leaving home.
We've got no food in, so immediately after dropping the legs and giving the dogs a walk we make tracks to the nearby Becketts Farm Shop. It's got a bit of a reputation this place, but my guess is that it will be full of overpriced food, and for £35 we managed to procure enough groceries to just about cover the bottom of our small basket.
Still reeling from that, after consulting the site details leaflet, Herself informs me that the nearest supermarket is a Sainsburys!!
It's dark by the time we get back and settle down for the night with a curry for tea, before changing into PJs. Time was getting on and the dogs got disturbed, barking at the stable door. it was then a head appeared with a cheery "Hello!" A legend of the internet had come to see us, yes, Dougle the biking dog was stood outside our caravan ...... he also had his owner with him, none other that Mr @andrewjditton
Saturday 13 October
It was warm and still overnight, very warm, outside didn't drop below 19 degrees and with 4 of us in the confined space of the van it got quite unbearable at one point.
Herself is still catching up on some zzzz when I go for a shower and then take the dogs for a stretch. I hate site dog walks covered with leaves, not everyone picks up, and you never know what's lurking.
We have breakfast before I throw up our canopy and then start to get ready to go out. I'm sat up front and there's a break in the clouds with the sun streaming though the window onto my chops, and I'm ashamed to say that I dropped off for a bit of a power nap.
Herself informs me that my snooze fest lasted the best part of 3 hrs and it's approaching 3pm by the time we've got ourselves together to go out for what's left of the day.
We head for Warwick first, and while it had lots of leaning Tudor buildings and stuff it didn't really grab our attention, so we didn't stop and carry on. Cruising through Stratford we note it's a lot busier and dive down a side street to a car park near an open air market.
Herself clocks the prices on the board and lets me in on the secret that we are paying £3 per hour (or part thereof) for the privilege of abandoning Vera, so the pace of our progress is upped considerably. Herself is taken by a wooden mobile for Beastie and a pair of earrings for herself, before we leave the market and walk towards the town.
I'm taken aback by a jewellers that has a pair of heavies stood outside and am thankful that Herself showed no interest in the stuff inside. We round the corner into Shakespearville, where every other building is dedicated to the man that scribbled some shit down on a scrap of paper with a quill.
Herself pops into the Xmas shop and I'm left holding onto the dogs outside what appears to be his birthplace. I take a bit more interest and clock a woman in period costume inside one of the windows. I'm quite underwhelmed by it all, and it would appear that I wasn't the only one, as Japanese tourists aimed their DSLRs at the dogs to get some shots of them in their harnesses!
Shakespeared out, and with the clock ticking in the car park, we head back to site, picking up a Chinese for our tea on the way.
Sunday 14 October
It's hammering down when we wake, and the works of fiction are not predicting anything else for the rest of the day, and tomorrow come to that.
Now, Mrs Starbucks always rips into me about the weather whenever she returns to south Wales, always claiming the weather is better up here in the midlands, painting a picture of some sort of sub tropical oasis. Apart from overnight on Friday (and what good is that to anyone) we've seen nothing but rain of varying heaviness since we arrived, so she can pipe down on that front.
By lunchtime cabin fever is starting to set in. I fire up the weather map in the vein hope that somewhere within 50 miles may be dry.
With that question answered, and the dire risk of conversation breaking out in the van, there's nothing else but to take a spin out and admire the world from behind the comfort of Vera's swishing wipers.
Off we set, in the general direction of the city centre, taking in the delights that Maypole, Kings Heath and Mosely have to offer on the way through. Herself was impressed, I could tell. The City Centre presented a wall of traffic and a myriad of road closures due to The Great Birmingham Run taking place. So after staring at the back of a National Express bus for an eternity, Herself suggests going back.
Many side streets are cruised and many wrong turns are taken, but we get to see the face of Brum that not may people do. Crackhead streetwalkers are out trying their luck and men stand on the white lines at traffic lights begging. It was not pretty until we'd cleared Sparkhill on our way out towards the wealthy suburbs of Solihull.
It would be unfair to load the dogs in the boot, drive around, and just head straight back, so we're on the lookout for somewhere to let them out. Out of the corner of my eye I spot something and make a lane change manoeuvre akin to the one Practical Caravan insist on doing when pretending to test tow cars.
Brueton Park proves to be a bit of a find, and I walk around the lake in my big coat and Mongo hat. Herself didn't get out.
We get back to site and it stops raining. The site is busy with new arrivals pouring in by the dozen. I give the van the good news with a sponge while Herself takes the dogs off for another walk now it won't involve getting wet. She's not happy on her return though, and is questioning the sanity of some people.
There is a pitch directly adjacent to the dog walk that has remained empty since we arrived, understandably so, but today it has been occupied. I'm not sure who would choose that pitch when dozens of others remain empty, especially when you have a cat with you? The poor bloody thing is a nervous wreck.
While washing the van I recognise an outfit that has pulled in behind us, a bright reg Ssangyong 4x4 pulling a Coachman caravan. I recognise it from the Twitter community and know it belongs to @davidjgbird , he was on the BBCs Caravanner of the Year TV programme a few years back, not that he likes to mention it at all you know.
Steak and Jacket spuds are eaten while darkness envelops the site for the night and we settle down with the sound of rain hammering on the roof.
Monday 15 October
We wake to the amplified sounds of rain drops hitting a sheet of aluminium stretched over a wooden frame. this is getting beyond a joke now, and I'm getting close to writing a strongly worded e mail to Mrs Starbucks to complain.
Checking out what @DerekTheWeather predicts does nothing to lift the gloom, so it's either get very wet or find something to do indoors. I dislike the second option as it usually involves parting with money in more quantities than I am comfortable with.
Breakfast was poached eggs on toast, but while I'm having a moan I'll get this one off my chest as well.
Herself was taken in by the packaging on these promising 85% double yolkers no less. We had one out of the half dozen, and even that was a half arsed effort. Conning gits.
With the dogs loaded up we take the back roads to Solihull and Brueton Park, where I run their legs off while Herself shelters in Vera from the rain.
With them knackered we press on further over to near the NEC where the delights of Resorts World await. We abandon Vera in a quiet spot and take the lift down to a world of pain.
Beastie benefits from our visits to Lego Wear, Hamleys and GAP before I get hit by the sucker punch in Clogau. Lets just say that Herself realised that a quick move to have lunch somewhere was required ASAP to lower my heart rate to an acceptable level.
A window table was taken in TGIs and we look out into the gloom while I devour a crispy duck.
Back to Brueton we head and Herself actually joins me for a walk in the rain, where the dogs get another bloody good run before returning to the caravan for the evening.
8.30pm, it's dark outside but we note that the rain has stopped hammering on the roof. What bloody good is that to anyone?
Tuesday 16 October
Bloody typical. On the day that we have a full day of indoor activities we wake to no rain, still we can't change plans as tickets are bought and it was the main (only) reason we've come here.
We're pulling off site by 9am and stop off once again at Brueton Park to run the legs off the dogs. By 10am the dogs are sleeping soundly in Vera's boot while we join the throngs outside the doors of Hall 12 waiting for the grand opening.
I never seen so many old people move so quickly at one time, and I'm pretty sure that if any council assessors were there watching there would be many a blue badge withdrawn. We let the piss soaked saga lot fight with the ticket people for a while before we stroll over and walk straight through into hall after hall of Campervan and Motorhome.
We're 4 halls deep before we even spot a caravan, and waste no time in looking around what was on offer, mentally crossing off the ones that didn't tick the boxes. We got chatting with Shaun and Doug from our local dealership, Ennis Caravans.
Moving onto Bailey we were totally unimpressed with the new Pegassus Grande before a salesman from Stowford made the mistake of taking me for a fool on the potential sale of a Unicorn Cartagena. We browsed all of the brands, but by now Herself's knee was starting to scream at her, so we retraced our tracks back to Compass to talk numbers with Shaun over a coffee in their VIP area.
We've seen all the vans we want to now, and in all honesty have made our minds up so head for the bar to talk things over while having a pint.
We've been having a lovely day, then it happened. I caught them out of the corner of my eye, but look the other way in vein hope, but no, we've been spotted and these two reprobates slide up at our table to spoil our day.
Seriously though, after years of interacting online it was very underwhelming to finally get to meet @TheTrudgians and @transit_driver . Dan is a git though, he knew what he was doing when he did it, and he knew what would happen. £36 Herself splashed out on a Jofli teddy bear for Beastie ....... no I'd never heard of them either.
We'd been in there a lot longer than planned, but the dogs were good as gold. We take them for a LONG walk before calling into Beech House in Solihull for some overpriced food.
Back on site we round the last corner before our pitching area and a familiar face jumps out of a Unicorn to wave us down. We've never met, but have been following each other and reading each other's blogs for quite some time. Lovely to finally meet @stevewills465 and @KarlaB465 and get the opportunity to quiz them on their recent Scottish adventure.
The canopy is dropped in readiness for an easy getaway in the morning before we settle down for the night after a long day as the site goes dark and quiet.
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