16th June 2018
Drizzly start to the day with a very poor visibility drive through the sea fog over the hill, before dropping down into Dorchester to enjoy free parking for carnival day (Thanks to the local council). The weather gradually improved as we pottered around the shops and coffee shops for the day, before watching a tae-kwon-do demonstration in the park, and the Dorchester Carnival parade through the streets (lots of children in cute costumes, but Notting Hill it was not).
17th June 2018
Ducks Cafe and doorstop sandwiches for brunch again (I’m starting to spotting a trend!) before heading off to find Chesil Beach. The 29 kilometre long shingle beach, we discovered, is quite difficult to get to by car for much of it’s length as roads tended to lead to caravan parks and other privately owned premises. Ended up near Fleet where we walked to a small nature reserve which seemed to be popular with the local dog walkers and one solitary small tent.
Headed back along the Jurassic Coast road to Lyme Regis fairly late on a Sunday afternoon parking high up in the steep town and practically running down to the sea front. Managed to find Aroma Coffee Shop which did a decent coffee and salted caramel cake, but was mostly memorable for the boat-like decoration of the back room and the elaborate decoration of its toilet. Listened to the local shanty singers on the seafront for a while then staggered back up the hill to find the car. Drove back to camp through the dreaded sea fog again, although we did at least have some Dorset brewed ales in the boot for consumption at a later time.
