Friday 21st October 2022
Driving towards Peterborough, and more specifically The East of England Showground, for Crafting Live. Well one of us was interested, and the other one was the driver who also refused to be tagged on Facebook.
After a non-stop drive we found the place without too much trouble (other than negotiating a lot of roundabouts) and immediately ordered sausage/bacon baps to give us the energy to survive the exhibition. An aircraft hangar full of women of a certain age armed with walking sticks, crutches, walking frames, and occasionally a 4 wheeled vehicle to assault us with. Soon after starting the stroll round the stalls Michelle asked for some assistance with loading a pile of craft stuff into her bag when there was no retailer nearby. Stan did ask if he was accomplice to shoplifting, much to the amusement of a nearby lady who vouched for the fact that she had actually paid.
Further amusement at The Wildlife Trust stand. Having had the benefits of membership explained to us, we decided to go away and mull it over, and then Michelle said we could come back and take out membership when we were at the show tomorrow! First Stan had heard of a second visit.
One more coffee, and an hour and a half later we were on the road to Oundle, and although we were earlier than the stated check-in time still disappointed by the fact that our room wasn’t ready yet. The Talbot Hotel is a beautiful old coaching inn right in the middle of the small town. We went to kill some time by exploring the town centre and stopped at The Coffee Tavern for a shared pizza and J2Os. It then started to absolutely throw it down, creating rivers in the streets - time for a coffee until it blew over and we could check in to our hotel. Easy check-in - asked for the name of the booking, handed over a keycard and told us where to go. That was it!
A lovely room at the corner of the corridor with soothing classical music playing as we entered. Nipped further along the corridor and out the fire exit to the car park to collect our bags. We combined the unpacking with a cup of tea and a bit of chill time.
Just down the road was The Rose and Crown which had some dubious looking clientele in the front bar, but quite an impressive American style diner in the back. Pasta bolognese/Speciality curry were both decent and plentiful - we were stuffed. Onwards to The Ship Inn and a couple of drinks in a friendly enough bar noticing that they were advertising a gig for tomorrow night.
Finished the evening with one more drink back in our hotel bar.
Saturday 22nd October 2022
After a full English breakfast we set off for a walk out of town past football pitches, tennis courts, Oundle rugby club, a building site and onto a muddy path down the edge of a filed and eventually to the village of Cotterstock. Crossing the River Nene next to the Millhouse and lock we set off back along the other side of the river. It was a lovely day as we negotiated many fields, stiles, small bridges, a couple of overhead road bridges, several dogs, a gang of swans on the river, and a bird of prey later identified as a red kite. Checking the map at one point we discovered that we were suddenly going way off course and found that the pathway marked on the map had clearly changed, so quickly doubled back and followed the river and the Nene Valley Way. The river meandered round to the right and we headed back into Oundle and made our way to Dexter’s which had earlier promised the best coffee and cakes in town. We felt we had earned them - flat white with chocolate orange traybake for Stan and chai latte with chai latte cake for Michelle which was declared a new worlds best.
Heading back to our room to drop off bags, then back out to check out a couple of shops in the town where we bought an owl. Back at the hotel again and we almost found ourselves in the middle of wedding photos as we tried to find our way in to our room. Showers, coffees, and another victory for Manchester City all took place before we were out on the town again.
We checked out the nearby Chinese restaurant but ended up in an Italian restaurant just round the corner from our hotel - Salerno’s - for an excellent fungi risotto/spaghetti nduja meatballs and a bottle of merlot. Thanks very much to the people who didn’t bother to turn up, and therefore left a table available for us. Suitably nourished we moved a few doors down the road for a gig by Broken Heroes at The Ship Inn. No sign of any gig as we walked past the windows or in the main bar, but the barman soon pointed out that we needed to go down the corridor, out the door, through the beer garden, and into the next room which seemed like a different postcode. They were doing some sound checks as we arrived but soon performed a decent gig for a local pub - Get it on and 20th Century Boy (T. Rex) were highlights of the show.
By the time we got back to our room after a bit too much to drink and over 20,000 steps we were definitely ready for bed.
Sunday 23rd October 2022
The BBC forecast for thundery showers had us wondering what to do - the nearest National Trust property didn’t even have a roof to give us any shelter. We had to dash across the courtyard with an umbrella just to get to breakfast, and discovered that yesterday’s wedding guests seemed to have taken over the place.
We decided that we couldn’t just sit in our room all day so set off in waterproofs and umbrellas down West Street, past the museum, down Mill Road, over the River Nene to Barnwell Country Park. Straight into the Kingfisher Cafe to get out of the rain. Coats and umbrellas dripping off the back of chairs as we enjoyed mugs of steaming tea whilst Michelle also perused the second hand clothing rail.
The sky finally seemed to run out of rain so we quickly set off to do a tour of the park, its lakes, hides, animal sculptures, and fairy doors.
Heading back towards Oundle, we popped into Oundle Museum, which was now open and chatted with one of the volunteers and learned about the history of our hotel as well as some of the the Roman history in the area. A couple of pounds in the donations slot in the wall, and purchased a book about Pep Guardiola from the second hand books in the foyer.
Back in Oundle in ever improving weather and headed into Beans Coffee Shop for quiche and salad before a stroll round past the old church and school buildings, and then back to our room for a bit of chill time. We thought we would head down to the town’s Co-Op for evening provisions only to find we were too late for Sunday opening hours. A quick double back towards our hotel and there was Tesco Express to save the day, and we got back to our room with sandwiches and snacks before the thunder storm started. Spent the duration of the storm watching Jodie Whittaker’s last appearance as Dr. Who.
Monday 24th October 2022
Checking out after breakfast we set off to visit Wicken Fen, which somehow seemed to be moving further away from us as we followed Google maps instructions. Finally got there to tuck into coffee and cake (Underwhelmed!)
Walking the Adventurer’s route in breezy sunshine it proved to be too warm to be wearing coats. After a while we sat in a hide trying to identify distant birds we knew nothing about with binoculars which may not be quite strong enough. We were scared out of the hide by some kind of sub-human who we dubbed Arnie (as in The Terminator) as he came in huffing and stomping around in huge boots. We thought that keeping quite was a pre-requisite of bird watching!
Rounding off our walk round the site with a quick visit to the shop for some jam and Kendal mint cake served by a member of staff who had lost her voice.
Driving onwards to Elveden just to remind ourselves what we used to drive through before the bypass opened, and then on to the very attractive Thetford Retail Park for tea at McDonalds. There was also a Sainsbury’s and we popped in for milk and a few provisions - during which time a Norfolk monsoon started and kept going until we got stuck in a traffic jam on the A11 just north of Attleborough. It was nearly 8PM by the time we got home after a very slow journey.