A weekend away

I'm just starting on writing this, an account of sorts of how this last weekend went recovering from the excitement as well as the heat of the last few days.

For me, time spent in little/middle headspace is time well spent simply for being me with this weekends adventure beginning with catching  the local bus to  get a connection to our principal rail station on which I consumed my packed lunch as I would be travelling across my usual meal times.

That made sense as I had some time to kill as the bus and trains don't quite tie in so well so I though I might as well check the destination boards, confirm which platform the train is due in and get there.

My train came in on time which London Midland trains usually do so I got on board with a case and two tote bags enjoying the ride through the new section of track at Norton Bridge which is helping with line capacity before arriving in South Staffordshire.
Why was I with two tote bags I hear you cry?

Hmm this was connected mainly with the second day which required food to be transported not my dollies and plushies because there was no space in the case for all of that!

Here I was met the the person who looks after me and we set of on foot through the busy town centre with its street stores calling in a shop and the market before getting into the car toward their home.

Having arrived I changed into my grey pinafore dress and had on my red and white stripped tie where I helped with the gardening, had fun out of doors and generally socialized enjoying our local butchers Pork chop and vegetables.

Sunday was the day of the  picnic as organized by a friend which generally involves a lot of bring various food  such as sandwiches, pies, cake and sausage rolls together with soft drinks to a well known view in South East England to share between ourselves and teddy bears.

We flew colourful kites competing with some massive model airplanes or venue users had, ran around blowing bubbles the size of clouds on the thermals, something I just loved, building massive plushie piles sometimes over people, a few played an acoustic guitar (How about playin' Birthday from "White Album"?) while we mark two peoples birthdays.

The weather was very sunny and hot - so sun cream sure was needed - and several bought ice creams no doubt to help.

Because we needed to get back early we didn't return to the organizers home so travelled back for an overnight stay.

I was up about a quarter of Five Monday morning to catch the six-twenty train to my local rail station before taking a taxi back home for a little after half seven in the morning.

I'd like to conclude this by thanking my friend for looking after me, everybody  at the picnic for bringing fun with them because it was what we all needed.

A Summer day trip

I went out on Saturday with daddy to the seaside departing from our estate on one of two coaches organized by residents where we travelled through our town to join the motorway network passing near Stanlow before joining the main A55 in North Wales, a semi-independent Country within the UK parking up at the coach park.

I left daddy to his own devices after getting off going some people I knew helping me cross the road to get into  the middle of town as there wasn't  a crossing and I'm poor with road sense.

 You may not of noticed it but in the gardens, there is this amazing clock set in the ground that looks rather striking from this angle. In the background on the far left is the Cenotaph and along the front there was a flower display marking  the start of World War One.

I agreed to met grumpy at 12:15 to make our way to a restaurant for lunch as being a Saturday it sure gets busy so you'd better get your skates on.

We went to Tribelles which had been recently taken over and revamped where the service was excellent from being met to getting your food in good time.

I had a 9oz Cod with chips and peas to whom the batter completely covered the fish itself so you had a whole lotta fish which is just fantastic for a growing little like me and tea which was very well cooked with the fish being moist but not mushy.

 There were a number of events taking place out of doors, one being a display and collection for the Royal National Lifeboat Institute, a charitable organization that rescues folk at risk on the water and that was one of their lifeboats.

Also the Lions had a vintage motorcycle exhibit with many plushies and flags on the bikes one even had Crazy Frog with his googles!

I spent part of the afternoon watching the Punch and Judy show with the children, shouting and screaming along jumping up and down for good measure cos I love letting my more little side out while not reading my Beano Summer Special comic with my childhood heroes up to their usual tricks and playing on the beach.

Llandudno is one of a number of seaside resorts that has managed to retain its long jetties into the sea -a pier- and along of which are many shops and amusements one of which this not that you'll me in or consuming their products.

Jetties have their uses apart from launching boats on, fishing being one and here's a family group doing just that.

The coastline with the Haufre Gardens toward the top left with assorted Alice in Wonderland related things to be found.

Making our way back to the coach, I had a Mint Chocolate chip ice cream locally made as in many parts of the UK there is an aggressive Seagull problem meaning sitting out on the seafront  with food you'll be attacked and possibly injured by said birds.

Sunny start to the day here as Marmalade has come in for his toast who smell is invading the front room, hope it doesn't burn(!) as I'll be out for part of the day enjoying the weather.

For all of the fans of this

 

And that's an awful lot of us,eh, one place I stopped by last Saturday was here.

You can follow the Alice trail across Llandudno which is an awful lot of fun.

A day trip out for a little sissy

I decided on Saturday September 6th to spend the day away and leaving our Town our driver decided to go via the Rail centre that is Crewe, the delights of the market town of Nantwich and the tranquil Bunbury near to the Shropshire Union Canal.

Enroute it looked rather dull especially over the Halkyn Mountains with a shower too but as you can see it was actually very sunny at this place. I think its overall feel is just that actually and it was heaving with people.

Got where this is yet? Okay it's Llandudno, North Wales about 15 miles from Colwyn Bay and as it happened just as I arrived boats were out taking people out to see the Great Orme and here is one with would be passengers.

That was taken before I went for a coffee, went to W H Smiths for my magazines  and visited a surviving HMV music store armed with a voucher and walking out with some cds that effectively cost me nothing.

There are many ways of getting around but the most intriguing is this road train that goes from East to West Shore with it's colourful livery. I wonder if it has a steam engine to power it?

Talking of power, we must of had some as Mummy and I won two prizes each on the bus raffle with a box of chocolate Fudge and a diary for me and wasn't it some co-incidence,eh?

A more conventional way is this special tourist bus. I just love the seaside, something that's a constant with me from my boyhood as we spent summers on the coast.

I had fish and chips for lunch out before strolling along the Promenade, just relaxing as you do between fighting the Seagulls off and running around in my shorts and cute ankle socks.

Mummy and I decided to visit some clothes and gift shops which was fun and then decided to go for tea and some cake in the afternoon where I had a really big slice of a lemon and cream cake which was delicious to tide me over until we returned a couple of hours later.

Little time away

 I was away for a few days with some friends I only met face to face last year so here is a few notes about that.

I travelled to one friend who kindly gave me a lift with them to the property we would be staying in with extensive grounds.

One of my friends brought a train set which kind of puzzled me as a number were girls and train sets generally don't go together with them but it proved to be quite interesting in that it is a Fairy based set a bit like this with Fairies, Trees and a Station and the Engine and Coaches in painted in girlie colours rather than the more boy sort especially the hobby sort like those by Hornby and the like. 

The track was made from wood with grooves in that you pushed the train along by hand.

I found myself actually enjoying  playing with trains sat cross legged on the floor , making hooting noises and yes having the odd crash as that little sissy gurl!

Perhaps this was just what I needed to work through my emotions.

A member of our little group had been rather poorly for a period and on the Friday evening I heard noises. 

Waking up the next morning I like the rest of the girls found a present which when unwrapped turned out to be a Tatty Teddy blue nose friend with mine being a "Peanuts" model.

Apart from being a really lovely gesture, this plushie didn't just talk, it conversed to others in the series when correctly set up, in an awfully cute way, talking of  having adventures, playing together and being best friends.

To me it seemed to sum up the whole feel of being together as girls and boys sharing and playing together

I spent a bit of time talking about dollies as a few of us had brought our dolls or that bit of our collections we could carry in our cases with us, learning  about them and why they mattered to their owners.

Among the many games I played Scrabble, Frustration (and boy wasn't it just!), Pool (well kind of!) and Tetris which was fun although with my amazingly bad co-ordination and memory it's not my strong point.

One thing I did enjoy which takes me back a bit to actual childhood was playing with guns that fire plastic pellets out with some of the 'younger' ones because many of the girls I played with were tomboys and we did these things while the boys were well out of doors, in the woods.

Just being out as a sissy gurl in hur jumper and skirt for several days with other littles was just magical.

My trip to Whitby

A few days ago , I was out on a trip out as in a hundred odd miles out and also out as with my blue t shirt , black shorts and grey socks with naturally a travel bag.   
In my world I'm always out as me.

We were going some 312 Miles round trip from where I live to Whitby in North Yorkshire, England  which is a old Port and seaside resort although you have a long walk to get to the beach. Our route involved travelling along the M6, changing to the M62 Trans-Pennine motorway and then getting on the A64 in North Yorkshire a little South of York.

The traffic was really bad travelling along the A64 just south of York along the Scarborough road for miles.

The scenery along stretches of this route took us over Saddleworth Moors in Lancashire, a very hilly area with sheep farms even though it's near to the Towns of Oldham and Rochdale and also well into the North Yorks National Park where much purple Heather and horses was spotted. They were beautiful at this time of year.

Because we were really late arriving the first step had to be fix food fast as I was starting to space out -the perils of running short on spoons - so I called in at Trenchers fish and  chip restaurant on New Quay Road, Whitby for fried plaice, English chips and several drinks of tea with brown sugar while I took some tablets.

It won awards in 2011 and 12 and upon tasting my late lunch, it is not hard to see why for the fish caught on the day  by fishing line was most tasty and the chips had a good not greasy taste to them.

Time was running short as because of drive hours issue with the driver we needed to be back at bus for 17:00 hrs I only had the chance to look at a couple of charity stores briefly before getting something to eat as we wouldn't be stopping off on the return trip.

That's the Bridge that links the harbour to the old town where many of the shops are  to be found in small streets, some cobbled. As befits a Port, there were places selling fresh fish!

Whitby Harbour. As you can see it was  very sunny day with quite as number of boats moored.

I had to use the 105mm moderate telephoto of this camera to capture this and carefully crop it later. Thankfully the more megapixels your image has, the better the result even if you use only a small proportion of the original image.

Kerrera caught my attention  while moored with its bold colours and flags

Finally an overview of the harbour.

It was a interesting day out even though it had taken rather a lot out of me physically as I hadn't been in the North East of England ever. One just wishes to had the time to see more of Whitby.

Taking a break in Weston

I went on a break to somewhere I hadn't been in ages on a local coach on Monday.

Most of the people on the coach were groan ups who looked very groan up but me being a LSG* said "Naw, I'm a little"  so went in my red school sweatshirt, grey school shorts as it was a bit less revealing in the wind than a skirt, grey long socks and regular brogue style children's' shoes. In addition I had my black messenger and tote bag.

When we arrived in Weston Super Mare, although I had been snacking on Barley sugars and chocolate finger biscuits - too bad they didn't have any animal shaped ones in - I was hungry so I called in at the Dragon Inn, a Weatherspoons public house that does food.
The food was nice , I had a Steak and Kidney pie and the manager was really funny!

Having eaten I felt like going on a bit of a walk around as I've never been here before and I'd have to say everywhere was super clean with litter pickers active during the day.

The beach was cleaner than a good number in North Wales I could think of with finely grained sand.

There is one automatic response when I see a beach and it involves a bucket and spade so guesses for what happened next! 

Also the next response is something like getting a Pirates flag and waving it around while jumping up and down like a super excited junior school gurl. Nobody I was with said anything!

What feminine boy with a Hello Kitty fixation couldn't resist the chance to win your very own Hello Kitty plushie? Well I sure couldn't!

Seaside towns often have amusement arcades, with exciting dodgem cars, things you can win teddy bears and plushies with and slot machines that I recall as a young boy spending a little time around.

The Pier was burnt down a few years ago but a great job was done of rebuilding it with associated facilities for that whole strolling along the pier experience. For an out of season weekday, it sure was busy.

Finally I had to be super careful not to get in the way of this the Great Western Land Train  that runs to the Harbour and back along the sidewalk. 

I think the Great Western was train company that operated in the South West of England before nationalization (and privatization in the 1990's).

The return back was much smoother stooping at Frankley services south Birmingham to freshen up

* Little Sissy Gurl, the non sexual frilly panties down gender identity I am

Choo Choo's Pt.2

Another place we visited a few times in the 1970's was the Vale of the Rheidol which is a steam train line running from the Welsh university town of Aberystwyth to the Devils Bridge some 12 miles downline.

I'm sure the engine we went on was called Owen Glendwr who I think was something of a hero to the Welsh fighting English occupation of their Country.

 The countryside in that part of Wales is very mountainous and really beautiful.