It's by the sea we'll breed
Jun. 3rd, 2018 09:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
satyricaI've been on holiday for the last week, which has been pretty glorious: I got a (delayed) train down to Lymington and headed to the campsite there where S&L had arranged for lots of my school friends to spend Half Term with their kids. We were kind of there in two shifts, so it was a shame not to have one big group but kept things fresh. Only S&L were fearless enough to camp for the whole week but I lasted until Wednesday and we had T&T plus E&A until Monday then TQS and H&A swapped in. Saturday we mostly just settled in, although some of us did manage a walk down to Keyhaven, then watched 45 minutes of amazing lightning out to sea in the evening, which thankfully never really brought any rain over to us.
Despite being so close to home, it's a little area I'd never really been to, being slightly off the train line and none of my friends having lived there, including to Hurst Castle which we headed over to on Sunday, joined by J&E and family. It was really sunny and we picnicked inside the long, narrow walls, later additions to the Tudor fort, before poking around the endless nooks, crannies and levels, then some of us walked back to the campsite via the spit that the castle is built at the end of.
On Monday, after a partial personnel change-over, we headed out to the stony beach at Milford-on-Sea, although didn't last too long before the sun made us beat a retreat, then in the evening my Dad picked me up to whisk me home for my Mum's 75th Birthday: my brother and his family also happened to be holidaying very close by (in Mudeford) so we were all very conveniently able to converge. We just headed into Lymington itself on Tuesday, via a mixture of bikes and cars, whilst S&R went off sailing, and I met up with R&P for tea and cake: I also headed back into town after packing up the next day as Lee works there and I met up with him for a bit on his lunchbreak before heading on back up to London. In between everything else there was a lot of games with kids (6 is an ideal age for introductions to Cthulu Mythos, right?), BBQs, campfires and just general very pleasant hanging out with people I usually only get to see for big gatherings or special occasions.
I got back in plenty of time to head out to Dingwalls Wednesday evening to see Yungblud, whose energy remains pretty irrepressible. I then had the rest of the week with time off in London, which I rarely do and was very nice. On Thursday N & I walked the Capital Ring from Crystal Palace to Streatham Common (taking us via Norwood Grove and Biggin Wood), which were all pretty new to me, including the inevitable tour of the Crystal Palace dinosaurs. Then Friday we went to the Roman Dead exhibition at the Museum of London Docklands before meandering through the uncanny world that is Docklands to Trinity Buoy Wharf, which was still very much under construction but had some cute little arty touches reminiscent of the northern shore of Amsterdam.
In the evening I headed back to the Hootananny to catch some bands: Al Bandini were a bunch of London-based (mostly) Europeans who are handily defined as "organic New Orleans gypsy blues pop", Captain Flatcap were mostly instrumental flute and trumpet-led live dance music and I was there for Crinkle Cuts who were a funk-reggae-ska melange, all very fun to dance to. I really enjoy the music the Hootanany puts on but I find the timings a bit betwixt & between, it's later than an evening gig but earlier than a full-on nightclub, which for some reason discombobulates me and meant I's already in sleep deficit heading out to Camden Rocks the next day, which will no doubt get its own post . . .
Despite being so close to home, it's a little area I'd never really been to, being slightly off the train line and none of my friends having lived there, including to Hurst Castle which we headed over to on Sunday, joined by J&E and family. It was really sunny and we picnicked inside the long, narrow walls, later additions to the Tudor fort, before poking around the endless nooks, crannies and levels, then some of us walked back to the campsite via the spit that the castle is built at the end of.
On Monday, after a partial personnel change-over, we headed out to the stony beach at Milford-on-Sea, although didn't last too long before the sun made us beat a retreat, then in the evening my Dad picked me up to whisk me home for my Mum's 75th Birthday: my brother and his family also happened to be holidaying very close by (in Mudeford) so we were all very conveniently able to converge. We just headed into Lymington itself on Tuesday, via a mixture of bikes and cars, whilst S&R went off sailing, and I met up with R&P for tea and cake: I also headed back into town after packing up the next day as Lee works there and I met up with him for a bit on his lunchbreak before heading on back up to London. In between everything else there was a lot of games with kids (6 is an ideal age for introductions to Cthulu Mythos, right?), BBQs, campfires and just general very pleasant hanging out with people I usually only get to see for big gatherings or special occasions.
I got back in plenty of time to head out to Dingwalls Wednesday evening to see Yungblud, whose energy remains pretty irrepressible. I then had the rest of the week with time off in London, which I rarely do and was very nice. On Thursday N & I walked the Capital Ring from Crystal Palace to Streatham Common (taking us via Norwood Grove and Biggin Wood), which were all pretty new to me, including the inevitable tour of the Crystal Palace dinosaurs. Then Friday we went to the Roman Dead exhibition at the Museum of London Docklands before meandering through the uncanny world that is Docklands to Trinity Buoy Wharf, which was still very much under construction but had some cute little arty touches reminiscent of the northern shore of Amsterdam.
In the evening I headed back to the Hootananny to catch some bands: Al Bandini were a bunch of London-based (mostly) Europeans who are handily defined as "organic New Orleans gypsy blues pop", Captain Flatcap were mostly instrumental flute and trumpet-led live dance music and I was there for Crinkle Cuts who were a funk-reggae-ska melange, all very fun to dance to. I really enjoy the music the Hootanany puts on but I find the timings a bit betwixt & between, it's later than an evening gig but earlier than a full-on nightclub, which for some reason discombobulates me and meant I's already in sleep deficit heading out to Camden Rocks the next day, which will no doubt get its own post . . .
