Last weekend saw us head off on the second leg of our staycation in lieu of our planned Orlando visit. Of course we’re grateful to be able to go anywhere right now and we had a lovely time. It’s still a little disappointing now and again that we weren’t in Orlando, but as I write this (Tracey here today) on this very pleasant Sunday morning, we would have been on our way back from Manchester airport and we would really really have the post-holiday blues. We’re usually half-giddy with happy memories and anticipating the joy of unpacking our cases and looking through the copious amounts of “stuff” we have bought, as presents and for ourselves, but also a bit miserable because our two years in the planning holiday is over. So on the bright side, we’ve still got it to come. Glass half full as usual!
Onto this week’s adventures. We headed off to the South Yorkshire, North Lincolnshire border to stay with my aunt and uncle. They moved there a couple of years ago to be nearer their daughter, understandable, but we really do miss them very much, so it was a joy to be able to go and stay with them, catch up and spend time with them, and my cousin and her husband, and also have a lovely few days here and there visiting new places and generally relaxing and enjoying ourselves.
We had a lovely easy journey up and spent a fantastic afternoon in their garden, which is so fabulous it looks like you should have to show your National Trust card to get in. We had a yummy buffet feast in the glorious sunshine and properly caught up with everyone’s news and it was great to see everyone fine and well after what has been a very trying and worrying period for everyone. So the visit started off well, relaxed, eating, drinking and chatting in gorgeous surroundings – great start indeed.
Our accommodation was fabulous, if it was an Airbnb we’d have rated it “5 stars – would stay again”. They provided us with a lovely spacious bright bedroom with a lovely roomy en-suite shower room so we didn’t get in their way too much hopefully and we could all keep safe.
Monday morning found us much like it would in Orlando, sitting outside in the morning sunshine drinking a cup of tea quietly and enjoying the view. No hot air balloons or smell of the orange groves, and possibly not quite so warm, but it was sunny and pleasant and the garden was alive with bees and butterflies and the smell of roses and sweet peas. Breakfast done, we headed off to a Waterside Nature Reserve that we found online. It’s at Barton Upon Humber, and as it turns out it was lovely. Nice and quiet so easy to socially distance, fantastic views of the Humber Bridge, peace and quiet, ducks to feed, some lovely scenery and a brilliant visitor centre that was perfectly set up to provide toilet facilities and a cafe all safely and nicely done. So a nice walk was followed by a little cup of tea/coffee and a big chunk of cake! Why not, we’re on holiday after all. A lovely morning by anyone’s standards. Next we headed along the coast to Cleethorpes. It was a lovely day and consequently a little busier than we would have liked, but we managed to keep away from folk and stay outside, and we had a good wander along the promenade. We had hoped to see the sea, but sadly it was so far out that you could barely see it on the horizon. We found a great outside garden cafe for lunch and then headed back to the prom for an ice-cream. Rob was delighted with his Biscoff cone covered in nuts and with a flake. I opted for a mint-choc chip and we walked along the sand eating them. We saw a little children’s fun fair area and there was a rickety green very tiny roller-coaster type thing. We were nearly hysterical with laughter as Rob filmed it and said “it’s not exactly Slinky Dog is it?”
It seems that no matter where we are in the world we are creatures of habit. Rob trying to eat his ice cream before it melted reminded us of the Ben and Jerry’s caramel filled giant cone he attempted to eat at Superhero Island in Islands of Adventure. He felt so sick and was so sticky but the end of it I thought that when he had his photo taken with Captain America and shook his hand he might well stick to him and they’d be trapped together with caramel. Happy days, and oh to be able to shake the Captain’s hand now – the current restrictions mean a distance selfie is the best you’ll get, but hey ho, we do what we can with what we’ve got. So even our UK holidays have us pretty much behaving the same way, going from one meal to another, from one snack to another, and copious amounts of coffee for Rob and cakes/treats for us both. Maybe the treats are different, we didn’t spy any cinnamon rolls or Mickey shaped pretzels, but there was cake and donuts and ice-creams a plenty!
Tuesday found us in York. We had parked at an outlet mall and used the park and ride facility to get us into York city centre. We had the most amazing time at the Yorvik centre. If you haven’t been – why haven’t you? You must go. It was fantastic, great information and fun and interesting and they have got the post-COVID system set up 100% perfectly. Ten out of ten to them for our experience there, we had a great time. Even in there whilst looking at Vikings we still manage to talk about and think about Orlando. The ‘boat’ ride round the Viking village was full of animatronic Vikings and one in particular stood out to us as a slightly less flash version of the shaman at the end of the Na’vi River Journey – we were laughing about that!
York itself was a little too crowded for our liking. The Shambles (a narrow street of olde world buildings and quaint little shops) was exactly that – a shambles. You couldn’t see a spare space anywhere and I doubt there was two inches between people let alone two meters. So we ducked out of that area quick sharp and went off to look at York Minster instead. All in all we had a good trip to York but the weather was not great and it was too crowded for us so just after lunch – a lovely pub lunch at the Slug and Lettuce – we headed back to the outlet mall to pick up the car. If we were in Orlando we’d have definitely done some outlet mall shopping, so we’ll just have a quick peek in here to see what it’s like. One hour and lots of bags later we emerge! Lots of room and not a lot of people so that was great. We’ve had some amazing Under Armour bargains, just like Orlando, some fantastic Yankee Candle bargains, just like Orlando, and some pretty sandals – always on the look-out in the Orlando stores for interesting shoes and sandals! Oh and of of course more coffee and cake – and even better that it was on the Government’s Eat out to Help out scheme so we hardly paid anything for a piece of cake as big as my head and some lovely drinks.
Lincoln was our final visit of the week – and we went with Aunt and Uncle. It was a lovely day. The weather was glorious and we strolled around Lincoln Cathedral which is absolutely stunning and then Lincoln Castle which was equally stunning. Fantastic places to visit and we had outside morning coffee, and lunch at the castle, and saw the Magna Carta. All very interesting and educational. We had a good old walk around the castle walls and the views were spectacular – Lincoln is a very pretty place and it’s definitely on our list to head back to at some point in the future. Everywhere in Lincoln seemed to have the social distancing measures sussed and the castle and cathedral too – limiting numbers inside so everyone can enjoy the experience in timed slots to keep everyone safe. Very successful – York please take note!! We ended the visit with…… guess what – a cuppa and cake of course. Headed off to M and S, which was pretty deserted, and with a couple of vouchers that Aunty Janine had, and the Eat Out to Help Out scheme – we paid 95p for four drinks and four chunks of cake! I mean – 95p. After topping our refreshment levels up we headed for home.
The last few days we have been back at home, relaxing, seeing a few friends in their garden as the weather has been great so we have had a nice couple of days back at home catching up with ourselves. We missed the cat too so we have had lots of cuddles and lazy morning cuppas in bed with a dribbly cat lying on us. On reflection I have concluded we like coffee, tea and cakes, we compare just about everything to Orlando, we think about and talk about Orlando most of the time, we are creatures of habit and we trundle from one meal to the next – always thinking about where we’ll have lunch, dinner or whatever. It’s kind of the same but different – we had to book visits to castles and museums, like we would have had to book park days in Orlando, we had lovely food and drinks in nice surroundings, like we would have in Orlando, we ate too much, definitely like we would have done in Orlando and we walked ALOT – also like we would in Orlando. No water parks, roller coasters, Cracker Barrel breakfasts or Cinnabon but all in all a fabulous trip, vikings, castles, walking, food and drink and lovely company, and some crazy weather, sunshine and torrential rain, so very Floridian.
Back into our normal routine this coming week and we’re still piecing our 2021 trip back together – flights and hotel dates not quite released yet for next year – so once that’s done, we can rewind to our planning our trip stage again and start looking at how the theme parks and the ongoing situation in Orlando is progressing. So far so good, modifications are being made still to experiences and attractions and park hours, and both Universal and Disney have released figures this week which revealed just how much their takings are down this year due to the unprecedented closure of the parks. Being the glass half full kind of folk we are we know it will get better, slowly and surely and with everyone being safe – slow and steady wins the race eh.
Check out our You Tube channel for the video of this week’s fun and frivolities – and to see the fantastic Not Quite Slinky Dog coaster and the Viking shaman at the Yorvik Centre. Fun times. Happy times. You know what else would make us happy – like us, share us, subscribe to our vlog and blog – pretty please! Have a safe week good people.
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