This was the first trip that we took on TWO seperate bikes.
14/04/06: Poole - West Woodlands
Took a quick turn around Sandbanks to settle in then at 10:30 headed out of Poole in the general direction of...mmm...North (possibly Stonehenge).
While heading along I snapped this shot of Rensche on the move. At the same moment I heard Rensche in my speaker: "Liefie there is a car behind you!"
Stopped off at the "Wheatsheaf" in Lower Woodford just above Salibary for an excellent steak pie. (Recognise the lyric?)
Headed towards a campsite just west of Stonehenge but as we approached it the road was closed (Army must have been on manouvers). So we headed West. Ended up at the gates of Longleat Safari Park who informed us they only catered for Caravans...no tents but did provide us with contact details of campsites in the area. We headed off to the " " Crockerton. The new owner of the establishment said they don't accomodate campers anymore...I also noted that the pub was a bit EMPTY...business must be slow. Anyway...we then phoned the next name on the list who had a pitch available.
We popped across to Seven Acres Caravan park at West Woodlands at about 17:30.
As we pulled in and before we even switched off our engines the camp cat made a bee-line for our nice warm seats.
What a stunning sight/site...bikes parked, tent pitched...all before the sun has gone down and approved by the local consultant.
15/04/06: West Woodlands - Glastonbury
Woke up to the sound of lions growling in the distance. Guess they were disappointed that we had not ridden through the safari park..."meals on wheels".
Thought we better take in some historical sites so stopped in at Nunney Castle. Very beautiful old ruin. Was informed by a very polite Lady walking her dog that in the 40's the castle was preserved using good modern Portland cement. Recently English heritage had to spent £0.5mil pounds replacing the mortar with a original Middle-ages mortar mix as the modern mix was eating away at the local stone masonary...modern advancements they say...
Stopped off for an excellent breakfast at Nunney's local greasy spoon; on the A361/A359 roundabout.
Stopped off at THE Wookey Hole Cave (http://www.wookey.co.uk/). Commercialised, bad taste, tackie comes to mind. We didn't even go into the caves as they would certainly not come close to the Kango Caves. So we headed off again.
Just at the top end of Cheddar Gorge we saw a bike parked up along the side of the road. Stopped off and the guy said that his engine had dropped all it's oil. He was clearly highly annoyed...it was also a brand spanking new SV650...hope his warrantee is still good.
We had planned to stop in Cheddar but as we cruised through town we were overwhelmed by the heave of peolpe everywhere...just kept on going.
Headed straight for a campsite shown on the map as being just outside Glastonbury. Pitched the tent and as we settled in the first raindrops fell...no surprises there then.
16/06/06: Glastonbury - Poole
Left Glastonbury at 10:00 and headed South. Approaching Crewkerne we spotted a farm stall sign along the road so we pulled in. as we were getting off the bike it was clear they they had been startled by our hi-vis vests as they asked rensche if she was with the police. We walked into the courtyard and clearly it was not a very clean and orderly establishment but it would have been impolite to just leave. So we ordered some coffee and a hot cross bun each and sat at a table. There appeared to be a bit of tention in the air and we overheard a phone call involving: "The TV will be here soon...Sam must be here...yes but we can't do it alone...". It appeared we were in the middle of an illegal occupation of the farm that the Somerset council intended selling off.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/somerset/4910326.stm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1754218,00.html
We left the scene just as a guy with a camera arrived...
We stopped off at West Bay (near Bridport) for fish'n'chips. Plenty other bikes around until a policeman arrived and started mulling around. Within minutes there were only a couple of us left hanging around who had a good chuckle with the cop who was just checking roadworthiness of the bikes.
Headed back to Poole via Weymouth and were back in Poole by 16:30.
We thank the Lord for protecting us on the trip and praise Him for the amazing and stunning scenary we saw along the way.
