15 June 2010
Hello campers!
It looks like summer might be on the way – and so it should be with the longest day nearly upon us – with a bit of decent weather and longer nights. The meet at Newsholme Manor was very enjoyable with the forties weekend at nearby Haworth a big attraction, many wonderful costumes and music made it a memorable day. I said summer may be on the way but it certainly wasn’t very warm in the evenings, we had to resort to sitting round the barbecue and drinking hot mulled wine to keep warm – it’s a hard life this camping lark!! Summer did visit us at Kirkby Lonsdale; it must have been the hottest weekend of the year so far – we were even sitting in the shade – sometimes we’re never satisfied!!! Sat in the tent on Saturday night I began to wonder if Raymond was in need of a bit of help from last year’s charity ( if he can remember what it was!) You know how you take in your choice of drinks and nibbles – well Raymond arrived with a couple of packets, emptied the first one into a bowl – lovely, salted peanuts – then when he came to open the second packet he swore blind he thought they were also peanuts but lo and behold! He was serving us savoury rice!! Either he’s becoming forgetful, he needs a trip to Specsavers or maybe it’s just the Yorkshireman in him coming out – I mean, he never even offered to cook the stuff for us!!!
At Langcliffe we arrived on Thursday evening to find almost 100 units already there and the marquees were already up – I guess that means someone remembered the “building instructions” that were handed out some weeks ago!! On Friday it was meeting old friends that you only seem to see here and making sure we were all fed and watered in time for the entertainment in the marquee ,an excellent comedy /singer Nick Miller ( no, not Mick Miller, he’s a lot older and bald !) On Saturday it was all hands on deck preparing for the fun afternoon; the weather was atrocious but that meant more people stayed on site and joined in the fun. The rain also meant that the barbecue stayed cold and a visit to the chip van for tea!! Saturday’s entertainment was also enjoyable; such was the excitement that a couple of chairs were broke, or maybe it’s the sign of a few good barbecues!! On Sunday at the coffee morning there was a last minute rush for raffle tickets which pushed up the total to £350, a magnificent effort, many thanks. In the afternoon Kev rigged up the projector so we could watch England’s last warm up game before going to South Africa which turned out to be a bit of a damp squib – Fancy winning 2 -1 and not even scoring!! It was fun shouting at the screen and trying to drown out the shouts from outside at the kid’s games! In the evening the bingo was very popular as always with last games paying out £108 and £98. On Monday the most strenuous thing we did was serve 100 cream teas! Then it was back to work on Tuesday for a rest!! Other lucky people stayed on for the rest of the week where they enjoyed more bingo and the re-opening of the Ribblesdale Odeon. There was also a new attraction for the kids big and little – the Ribblesdale Water Slide – in this day and age with PCs, X –Boxes, I pods and so on, it’s amazing how much fun can be had with a piece of polythene, a bottle of washing up liquid and a few (!) buckets of water! A race night Saturday evening rounded the week off nicely. There was a total of 218 units camping with over one thousand camping nights and nearly as many kids ( or maybe it just seemed like that!) Talking of kids, some budding Alan Sugars put their brains and muscles to good use by fetching and carrying water for campers throughout the week and raised £28 which they very generously donated to our charity Help for Heroes so a big thanks to all of them.
We have just had a weekend at a new site, Worsthorne near Burnley where we were surrounded by lovely countryside and a stunning view of Pendle Hill; we also picked up some new members Rebecca and Simon with their kids who had turned up to stay on the five van site but were persuaded to join us on the rally which they seemed to enjoy – I hope they weren’t hoping for a quiet weekend!! Kevin me and Jimmy had a treat in the afternoon when we went to watch Steven who was going up in a helicopter for his 21st birthday and would you believe it, there were spare places on the flight so we all had a go – an experience well worth trying, fun trying to spot places you know, it all looks different from up there!!
At tea time we all joined in with a communal barbecue making the most of the sun; then it was back to the Odeon for “ Nightmare in South Africa” and the less said about that the better!! Let’s hope they pull their socks up for the rest of the tournament!! Just a thought here – if you run out of toilet roll have a word with Billy they have plenty after Dawn sent him for kitchen roll and he came back with toilet roll instead – don’t know about should have gone to Specsavers, more like should have remembered your glasses in the first place!!
This weekend we are at Thorpe near Grassington, a very picturesque site by the river, the meet starts at 10am, take care at the entrance. The weekend following is another site by the river at Barden Bridge car park near Bolton Abbey, meet starts at 1pm. The first weekend in July we are at Lower Greenhill Farm, Salterforth where Stewards Phil and Christine are putting on a black pudding and burger evening on Saturday; If you want to take part you need to contact them before the meet so that they know how many black puuddings to get from Bury, you can contact them on 01282 835677.
Many of us are starting to drift off on holidays soon but you are still very welcome at any of our meets, if you are off on hols have a good time and see you when you come back!!
See you on the field, Karen B.
