Muddy Marge

 Norden, nr: Corfe.

Last night, what a night, the van was a rockin', the rain ran off Marge like teardrops and the church bells tolled every fifteen minutes in the darkness.  All a little bit scary, but we'd experienced worse when we spent a night in a small tent on a cliff top in Spain, whilst cycle camping six years ago. 

The terrors of the night gave way to a calm morning which dawned bright. We waited and waited for Trudy and Andrew to bring the bacon baps, but they didn't arrive. So, it was back to omelette and cereal. But we were happy, we were in a beautiful spot and all was good. There's a saying, 'if you don't get out of bed smiling, then try another life'.

After breakfast we walked down to Lulworth Cove. A few lines on the side of a building caught our attention. 

After many years of visiting this natural world heritage site we were a little taken aback that it had been transformed in to yet another site of cafe culture. The once shack of a cafe had gone, and the steps where a local hippy used to sit and paint pebbles and shells from the beach, replaced by a slick new structure selling paninis and coffee. Walking boots had been exchanged for flip flops. Totally inappropriate footwear for climbing the cliff paths. Ignoring the change, we walked along the beach fossil hunting, handing the few we found to a family whose search had been to no avail.

Then a walk up to stair hole, before succumbing to 21st century tourism and buying ice creams at how much!!

Back at Marge, we stepped inside the Holy Trinity Church. Built in Norman times the church was peaceful and enjoyed views across the countryside to the sea.

Lunch eaten we left the picturesque village of West Lulworth heading for Swanage. We had not travelled far, when John's daughter Dawn telephoned to say that our granddaughter Cath had landed an internship scriptwriting for a major festival (Writing On The Wall) in Liverpool. Fantastic news, we were very pleased, but not half as pleased and proud as her mother was. 

Swanage was quiet, too quiet for a day in May. We took a walk to the Old Forge Antiques Shop as we always do when in the area to see what mid-century furniture they had in, passing on the way the engine sheds of the Swanage steam railway, where we stopped for a while to watch a man cleaning out a boiler on one of the steam trains.

Late this afternoon we were once again back at The Halfway Inn near Corfe, as tomorrow we are meeting Angela's son, his wife and our youngest grandson in Poole, with fingers crossed for good weather so our grandson Elliot can put his new bucket and spade to good use. Early this evening we sat out for a while in the pub garden with a few other brave souls, including a young couple in their twenties. The young lady had ripped jeans on, so badly ripped on one leg they were basically very short shorts. She had even longer legs, than our Marge. Breed them tough down here in Dorset we thought, as we sat in multiple layers and scarfs.