Weebls and Arbeia Roman Fort

8/5/2010

So after last weeks adventure to South Shields and the disaster that occurred (the Roman fort daring to be closed!) we decided to venture back the following weekend. We got up nice and early (12) and finally set of at 2pm, after 2 hours of me harrasing everyone to get up to accompanying cries of 'the fort closes at 5! We've only got 4 hours hurry up and get ready!!!' We finally set off.

In all honesty the fort was a bit of a let down, but it was free to get into so its not like we wasted any money paying to get in, and it killed an hour. We climbed into the fort bit, went on the battlements and observed the rest of the ruined fort, it was quite interesting, but Carolina wasn't impressed.

Main part of the fort

The ruins behind the fort

What's left of the fort wall

There were children's entertainments inside the fort that Socks and Carolina played with. One was a box of smells, and you had to guess what smell was in each box. One of them was urine. Socks tricked Carolina into smelling it. Socks wins at life. I hope someone weed in the box and they didn't just buy the smell from somewhere. I wonder where you can buy smells?

The box of smells

Actual urine

Opposite the car park we saw some weird statues and went to investigate, they were weebls and meant too look like women I think - I'd like to see the model these were based on though. I don't know why they were there but they just were, decoration I suppose. Socks and Carolina molested them. They are so childish.

View of the weebls from the car park

weebl

Perverts

South Shields fun fair

8/5/2010

I literally don't know why I have forgotten to blog about this, Carolina, Socks and I went back to South Shields again to go on the fun fair and play crazy gold. Socks was really excited about crazy golf, he was talking about it all week and acting like a child dizzy from eating too much sugar.

Cannibalistic Hot dog

Carolina loves brum

The fun fair was an actual rip off, for £5 we got 10 tokens, which may seem like a lot, but when the bigger rides - like the pirate ship and roller coaster - were 4/5 tokens each we soon ran out. First of all we went on the pirate ship, which was amazing, I haven't been on one of these for soooo long, since I was about 13. 

Next we went on the baby roller coaster, (not for babies just a small roller coaster). Socks and Carolina weren't scared, but I was, I almost wet my pants and had my eyes shut throughout. I am a chicken. The ride didn't last very long, but it was long enough for me.

Then we went on another ride which involved lots of spinning, I don't know what it was called, but it was my favourite. It went on for ages, and I managed to get some photos of the other two, don't they look like they are enjoying themselves?

Before the ride began

Probably my favourite photo of all time - Socks face is amazing

After we spent all out tokens, we moved on to crazy golf. Carolina proclaimed herself the best and I said I would probably come last, but when we got the results this was reversed, not to boast but I was far better than the other two! Socks was atrocious and hit the ball so hard that on 3 occasions the ball flew out of the golf course and on to the road, or into the pond.

Socks retrieving ball from the water

The whole course was pirate themed, I don't know why, but they always seem to have some thought of mental theme, I guess this is because is is CRAZY golf, and nothing is meant to make sense.

Also because adults may feel more inclined to pay the ludicrous price if it looks like some kind of effort has been made by including pirate ships and what not, rather than just a grassy fields with holes in it.

Socks returning from retrieving another ball and view of gold course

Pirate ship props

Odd barrel water feature

Seaham Beach

Escaped the unavoidable exam revision again by driving down the coast for a bit. After almost driving into a hedge I saw Seaham cliffs from the road and pulled over. The cliffs were beautiful , the bright yellow field of rape, the sun damaged dullish green grass and the dark blue sea in contrast with the light blue sky was pretty awesome. I walked along the cliffs for a bit until the cloying smell of rape was too over powering and threatened to suffocate my airways, so I walked down to the beach.

There were plenty of people and dogs on the beach, along with quiet a few children - which always makes it odd to photograph as I think some one is going to accuse me of being a paedophile(so far no one has!). The tide was out - always a bonus when trying to walk on the beach, but there were thousands of stones.

Cliff top view towards Seaham

Cliffs

The beach from the cliffs

Rape field over looking the sea

Bad, dangerous, slippy rocks

Dog walkers on the beach

Looking towards Seaham

girl in the waves

Cliff shadows on the beach

Wear side

Today I went for a walk on the wear side, not somewhere I'd been before although it is just outside my house.

Once again I went on this adventure alone, after deciding on the spur of the moment to flee the house and my looming exam revision timetable. It was quite a nice walk, hot weather - I even remembered sun cream this time.

 I also got leered at by some men , who were probably old enough to be my parents.. although saying that since 12 year olds have kids up here thats probably not the best way of saying they weren't far off retirement.

Anyway here are some pictures of my walk:

View of the bridge

river side walk way

These never seem to get used, but the water makes a lovely colour contrast

Wear side walk way, very green and pretty

building ward on the river bank

Suicidal speed boaters on the river watched by a couple of cha(r)vs

view of Wear side

Ashburn Park

last blossom on the ground

Dry river bed

View of Ashburn house from the park

Ashburn House

Girls sitting in the park

Bluebells, dandelion clocks and buttercups

The river that runs through the park has all but dried up in some places

Sun shining through the trees

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Norwich

Today was the day the sun literally decided to try and melt my face off of my head in the space 10 minutes - it was hot. 

I took the photos below in Norwich standing on the bridge over the river wensum, just outside of Anglia Square. I loved the reflections of the sky and the houses that were reflected in the water. I thought they were beautiful.

Thank you sun, you made my day.

Photographs taken on Fye Bridge over the river Wensum, Norwich.

The Norfolk Broads

I wanted to do something a bit different to celebrate my 21st birthday so I put the question to my friends at home, and we came up with the idea of renting a boat for the day and going on the Norfolk broads. 

A couple of us have driven boats before so we figured we would be ok and the risk of capsizing would be small.

The 'crew' and our trusty steed

The four of us assembled in Wroxham at the crack of dawn (10am) along with our picnic supplies and climbed aboard the boat that would be our floating home for the next 4 hours. We were issued some sexy bright orange life jackets and told it was so simple to drive the boat that we couldn't possibly mess it up... those sounded like famous last words to me. 

Lucy was pretty worried about being afloat - should we have capsized, she would have had the most to lose as she can't swim, and we were told that the person who falls over board has to swim to the boat, not the boat go to the man over board. 

 Part of me wishes she had fallen in (or anyone for that matter), but alas, she did not.

Sexiest life jackets of all time

We then set off out of the boat yard and down the river. Beth was driving to start off with as she had the most experience, she was issued with the 'captains hat' that Rachel had thoughtfully brought along. 
No one was allowed to drive the boat unless they were wearing the captains hat. This was the law of the boat.

Leaving the safety of the boat yard

Beth modelling the captains hat

After we had successfully navigated our way out of the boat yard, we emerged onto the river. The boat was incredibly sensitive to steer and it took Beth a while to get the hang of it, every time she turned around to talk to us the boat would veer off course and head towards the bank. Luckily we didn't crash, but we had a few near misses, and I'm pretty sure we concussed a pair of swans at some point.

View of the river from the back of the boat

Docked sailing boats

It was a really hot day - I should have brought sun cream, because once again I burned - and there was a lot of wildlife swimming around. Lots of swans, geese and ducks with there babies, which were very cute -although they do seem to swim straight at the boat which surely doesn't help their chances of making it to adulthood.

A pair of geese and their goslings

A grieb

As soon as we set of we pretty much started eating our picnic. It didn't matter that it was only just 10am, as far as we were concerned it was lunch time. Since this trip was for my birthday, we donned the party hats I had brought, and cut the cake - which had melted a little bit on the drive over. We also opened the fruit, juice,crisps, dip and home made pizza that Beth had brought. 

Melted birthday cake

Party hats!

After we had been travelling for about an hour and half, we came to the village of Horning, which (obviously) has the river running through it. It had some incredible houses on the river side, which instead of having a garage to park cars in, they had dock to moor their boats in! 

Houses on the riverside

They have docks for their boats, rather than garages for a car

After we had travelled though Horning we decided to park the boat for a while and go for a walk. This was harder than we anticipated, none of us had ever done this before apart from Beth, whose words of wisdom on the subject were 'Just wrap the rope round the pole and hope for the best.' 

So as we drifter over to the dock, Beth clambered onto the front of the boat and then leapt off onto dry land. This is where the plan came unstuck, we weren't really sure how to get the boat parallel to the dock, we turned the engine off but this was a mistake and didn't help. But luckily a helpful gentleman came to our aid and assisted us onto dry land. 

 While Rachel ran off into the bushes for a wee, we had a look around.

Dock at Bure Marshes Nature Reserve

Riverside

Rachel going for a wee

Bure Marshes

Ducks on the riverside

We saw the paddle steamer, but I wasn't allowed on it

We travelled up the river for another half an hour, but then we turned around and headed back. We started to play a game of catch with a tennis ball and sticky velcro pads, we managed to play for quite a long time before I accidentally threw the ball too high and it landed in the water. Lucy was driving at this point, so we set about organising a rescue mission. We circled the ball for about 5 minutes, but couldn't reach it, as the waves the boat made kept pushing it away. But then Lucy drove over the ball and Beth managed to lean out of the boat and grab it. Mission accomplished!

Playing catch

Water ball

Rachel and Beth successful rescued the ball

After all the drama, we went drove back to the boat yard without further mishap. It was a great day, and a really nice way to celebrate my birthday. It cost £50 to rent the boat for 4 hours, from broadland boat hire in Wroxham.