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2016 has been a quiet year for holidays. In late August we went to Northumberland and visited my sister. It coincided with the “Tall Ships” race which was in Blyth Harbour over the Bank Holiday weekend.

We then drove over to the Lake District for a few days of walking the hills. We stayed in the South Lakes at the Britannia Inn at Elterwater on the north side of Windermere.

We were only back home for a few days before we were off to North Wales and Snowdonia. A Christmas present from my daughter Holly and her husband John was a Zipwire down Snowdon. I had been putting it off but it was coming to the time when the voucher would expire so I booked up for the middle of September. We booked into the Royal Oak Hotel in Betwys y Coed for 3 nights and took in the sights with some lovely walks. On the Tuesday we headed up to Snowdon and check in for my Zipwire. They start you off on the short run Zipwire to get you used to the experience then drive you up to the top of the mountain to take on the challenge of “Velocity”, the longest zipwire in Europe and the fastest in the World with speeds up to 130mph. This was a fabulous experience but because of high winds we had to have sails on our wire but still managed to get up to 117mph, so exhilirating and a great time.

Towards the end of September we took ourselves down to Cornwall. We stayed 3 nights in the lovely fishing village of Polperro. A beautiful place with some great restaurants and Pubs. Un be known to us it was the weekend of the Looe Music festival so we took the bus into Looe to have a mooch around. Such a beautiful harbour and the place was buzzing with the music festival goers. The next day we decided to go back to Looe but this time walk there via the South Western Coastal path. This was a magnificent clifftop walk with fabulous views. The weather very kind to us and the sun shone most of the way in our 4 hour walk.

We then headed down to The Lizard and on the way stopped off at “Lanhydrock” a NT place we visited nearly 30 years ago when we lived in Bude. This is one of the best kept NT Houses in the country, in my opinion, with Cragside in Northumberland coming a close second.

We were staying the Polurrian Bay Hotel in Mullion perched high on the cliff top looking over the Atlantic. It was a great place to stay to explore the Lizard. A lovely cliff top walk from the Hotel to Poldhu Beach via the Marconi Museum (he sent the first transatlantic morse message from here) and after a nice cuppa at the beach cafe retraced out steps back to the hotel. A trip down to Kynance Cove at low tide was fabulous, what a beautiful setting. We carried on to Lizard point and wandered around the Lighthouse. We then headed to Ruan Minor and picked up a couple of the best pasties (Oggies) that I have ever tasted. We then carried on to Falmouth where we ate our lunch on the harbour front. On another day we went to Penance where we spent the morning. All in all it was a great week down in Cornwall.

The middle of October we joined our good friends Phil and Jill Budden for a week in Pissouri Bay, Cyprus. We had fabulous weather with temperatures in the 30’s the whole week. We were joined by their daughter Sarah and her fiancé Simon later in the week. One of the highlights was Water Skiing after a 31 year absence. The Skiing was great but the after affects, aching knees, Hips and shoulders took a few days to get back to normal.

Some of the highlights of our week in Cyprus was a trip up to the Akamas peninsula and taking a boat trip up to the “Blue Lagoon” where we had a swim off the boat. We also took a trip to the east of the Island and visited Fig Tree Bay, Ayia Napa and Nissi Beach. These places have changed out of all recognition from my time here in the 70’s…. Our thanks to Phil and Jill for being our hosts for the week.