back to life

My brother’s mother in law has a caravan in Bigbury on Sea in Devon. So every chance he gets he packs up the car and the family and heads down there, a lot of the time taking our mum with him. So not to be left out I felt it was time to go and see what all the fuss was about.

Once we’d got off the M5 and A38 we drove through the lovely villages of Modbury, Ringmore and St Ann’s Chapel which had the most prettiest thatched cottages and narrow winding streets. The holiday park couldn’t have been in a better position a few steps away from a beautiful, sandy beach.

Just over the hill, or a walk  around the bay if the tide is out, is Burgh Island where the elegant Art Deco hotel sits. The Burgh Island Hotel was built in 1929 and boasts many famous guests including Edward and Mrs Simpson,  Noel Coward and Agatha Christie. The Hercule Poirot mystery “Evil under the sun” was filmed on the island and in the hotel. When the tide is out it is possible to walk over to the island, but the only way across at high tide is the sea tractor. Although it was quite a steep hill I managed it at a very slow pace so I could take a closer look and it was definitely worth the effort, the views were outstanding and breathtaking.

The worst thing about staying on a holiday park is the evening entertainment at the park’s club. But we had to go because my nieces were all dressed up in their fancy dress finery for the competition, Rapunzel and Dorothy, (Wizard of Oz), respectively. Thanks to the combined big mouths of their grown ups they managed to get to the final 4 via the cheer o’meter, sadly they didn’t win but they looked fabulous anyway. That was the only high point of the evening, from that moment on it slid into holiday camp entertainment hell.

Day 2 of our visit was a trip to Dartmouth, I’ve been there quite a few times when my boys were young because they were obsessed with the steam train that took us there. The place really hasn’t changed much over the years, but I had the tastiest chips I’ve eaten in a long time for lunch. After a potter around the many little gift shops we headed back to the caravan before the rain set in.

Although it was only an overnight visit this time, we got a lot done and had a wonderful time in a lovely part of the country.

One of the books on positive thinking I read suggested creating a board to pin on my goals and wishes and things that I am thankful for in my life. So I bought a cheap cork board and used some pretty fabric and ribbons I had lying around to cover it. I pinned on what I needed to and put it in a room where I could read it everyday.

6 months later most of my goals and wishes have been met; I am feeling much better now since my illness, I am a writer,( albeit just a blog but writing I am), I am much happier, I am almost working again and Hasan’s work is going well. All that’s left is for me to come into a large amount of money and it’s job done!

So I’m now planning my next board with a new set of goals and wishes, my things to be thankful for remain the same; the love and support of my sons, family, friends and Hasan.

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Although I do have a little more I have written about Turkey, I thought I’d give it a bit of a rest and write about my own lovely country for the next couple of posts.

As I hadn’t seen my eldest son Scott since Christmas, I felt it was time to invade his life again. So accompanied by my youngest son Jake and my mum I set off for Winchester. It’s such a pretty city and I love it, it’s small and compact and easy to get around by foot. By car it’s a nightmare because of the one way system in the centre.

The city is steeped in history, the earliest settlements date back to 150 BC, the Romans moved in in 70 AD and moved out in 410 AD and in Saxon times Winchester was the capital of England under the rule of King Alfred the Great. It continued to be a very important city for the monarchy and running the country for centuries, Queen Mary Tudor married Prince Phillip of Spain in the magnificent cathedral in 1554 and King Alfred and King Cnute are interred in there.

As we were only there for a few hours and we had to fit in cleaning Scott’s house, eating lunch and essential shopping at Tesco’s, we only really had time to visit the Cathedral and we’d been in there before so we just loitered outside for a while moaning about the admission fee to go inside!

The present Cathedral was completed in the early 16th century but there has been a sacred building on the site since the 7th century. Not only are there a few dead royals buried in there but also St Swithun, (of the rain for 40 days and nights fame), who was once a bishop of Winchester, but his bones have long since disappeared from his shrine. The novelist Jane Austen is buried there and her house at Chawton, nearby, is a museum.

The most interesting, local famous person buried there is William Walker a diver who started his career in the late 19th century. In the early 1900’s cracks started to appear in the cathedral’s walls, the foundations were waterlogged. William worked everyday in the darkness for 6 hours between the years 1906 and 1911  placing bags of concrete to reinforce the foundations. On completion of the work William was honoured in a thanksgiving service, where he was presented with a silver rose bowl by King George V. As well as being buried in the cathedral, there is also a statue of him in there.

But the most important fact about the cathedral for me is that in just over a years time I will be watching my son at his graduation ceremony and I will be the proudest mum in the world.

I finally got all my stuff up together for the return to nurse practice course. I had to organise my own placement and get the references myself, the application form was at least 9 pages, it was like writing “War and Peace”! I sent it all off yesterday and will have to wait now to see if they will have me.

Also just checked my emails and I have another interview for a healthcare assistant on the bank in the hospital where I started my training in 1985. So that should be interesting working there again. I didn’t expect to hear from them as in the job advert they stated they were only looking for people to work over 30 hours a week. But I decided to apply anyway and tell them because I hadn’t worked for 6 years, I didn’t think I could manage 30 hours. This result is encouraging because I’ve also applied to 2 other jobs and asked if I could be considered working  less hours. Things are not so set in stone anymore and of course if you don’t ask you don’t get.

On a wet and dreary day we combined taking Hasan’s new boss’s car for a service in Ortaca, with a visit to nearby Dalyan to see the magnificent Kings Tombs carved into the Rock face.

To find the tombs we had to drive down some quaint narrow streets, we eventually ended up at a restaurant across the lake from the tombs that was full of very pleasant German tourists. Once they had re boarded their coach we polished off their buffet lunch and sat with the owner of the restaurant. He was very knowledgeable about the tombs and the nearby ancient city of Kaunos and it was a joy to listen to him.

The tombs were built, probably in the 4th to the 2nd century bc, to bury the Kings of Keunos, hence the name! They are built in the Hellenistic period style, using columns and temple facades. They really are quite an incredible sight and I just looked in awe of the achievements of those ancient builders.

The city of Kaunos behind the tombs on the other side of the hill  is an ancient seaport town, architectural finds at the site have been dated back to 4th century bc.  In mythology Keunos the son of King Miletus ran to this area and settled there to escape his twin sister Byblis who had developed incestuous feelings for him.

The city was inhabited through many civilisations; 1st and 2nd Persian rule, Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine. But in the 15th century the area was hit by a Malaria epidemic and the city was abandoned.

Unfortunately we never got to see Kaunos because the weather was so foul and we had to get the car back to Icmeler. But I will definitely make time to visit there on my next trip to Turkey.