The lack of boating activity over the winter period is not nice, so we were delighted to receive an email a few weeks ago inviting us down to Brighton this weekend for a 'boaty gathering' by our friends David & Lisa from nb 'What a Lark'.
We travelled down on Friday evening after John had finished work and joined the happy band of gathered folk - David & Lisa (obviously), their friends and 'boat sharers' David and Amanda and Joe and Lesley from nb Yarwood whose blog we have followed for sometime but we had never actually met.
We had a lovely evening getting to know each other (and drinking) with only a brief discussion on toilets (compulsory amongst boaty folks).
After breakfast on Saturday we headed into Brighton by bus. One of the first buildings we came across was The Prince Albert pub with a fantastic mural of musical legends covering the outside wall. Having named many of the faces, it dawned on us that they had all passed away !! The pub wall is also well known for a 'Banksy' picture of two kissing policemen which you can just make out bottom right of the picture
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| Mural of musical legends |
We soon found ourselves in a pub (due to the weather of course) and the ladies decided to sample some of the 40 different gins on offer before heading into town to do some retail therapy, leaving the chaps to fend for themselves in the pub. When we met up again we had an interesting wander around The Lanes and we have never seen such a concentration of jewellery shops which the girls found most interesting !!
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| The girls enjoying a gin - Amanda, Lisa and Lesley |
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| And off to the shops outside Brighton Pavillion |
We then returned back to base camp and watched the rugby on TV as England saw off Scotland on a terrible pitch and Wales got thumped by Ireland which went down quite well too. This was followed by a battle of the sexes game of 'Articulate' which wasn't competitive at all and which saw the boys come out on top :-)
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| A great host but it was all a bit tiring !! |
Today we headed for the seafront for a very pleasant and very bracing walk, including a bacon butty and mug of tea halfway round, before we returned over the top of the cliffs. The wind was certainly fresh, and the sea very lively, but it was a lovely way to spend the morning.
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| Group shot - Joe, David, David L, Amanda, Lisa, Lesley and John |
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| Waiting patiently for breakfast - Amanda, Lisa and Louise |
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| Seafront with Brighton Marina in the distance |
Sadly, after being treated to a lovely roast pork dinner and the most wonderful homemade Bakewell Tart (coming from Derbyshire we know our Bakewells and this was REALLY good) we had to say our goodbyes for the trip home.
We really have had a cracking weekend. Great hosts, great new friends and all due to the power of 'the blog'.
If we had known you were in Brighton, its only down the road from us we could have joined you all. Hope we meet up this year again! x
ReplyDeleteWe were going to get in touch but saw you were out of the country in the sunshine.......again !!!! We will certainly see you later in the year. Keep in touch.
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