As I write we should be somewhere south of Barcelona heading towards Valencia on Seabourn Encore, but alas we’re not. Cruising has suffered a devastating blow during the pandemic and nearly all cruise ships remain out of service.
Personally I think the criticism of ships widely expressed in the media is wholly wrong and misleading to the non-cruising community, indeed as any regular cruiser will tell you, hygiene standards are quite exceptional onboard, at least up to the point of delivery, unfortunately after that one’s fellow cruisers can’t necessarily be trusted an inch. In what I now think of as Cummings’s Law human nature lets us down by varying degrees, or not at all, depending on one’s ability to adhere to common sense and good manners
Is this a travel blog? Yes - I am getting there - we decided that as it was impossible to cruise now, yet we really need a holiday to look forward to, as soon as it became likely hotels would be open we’d plan a UK tour just so we could get away from the madness of work. It’s hard not to sound ungrateful, when millions - literally many millions - are not working and of those more than a few will not get to go back to their jobs, to moan on about work and indeed I love my job but it’s been so intense since lockdown a break for us both is essential.
Fitting around Hubby’s crazy diary and ironically the only slot we could get with a local hairdresser mean we have 13 nights starting on a Wednesday to play with. Further experimentation with booking systems of particular hotels we fancy, plus a sense of route to follow, gives us a great itinerary based on four centres, and with the enhanced restrictions in other parts of the Kingdom we settle on an England-only UK tour, which is a shame as our planned Easter weekend in Wales would have otherwise become one of those centres - save to another time.
Not quite having schuck the cruise habit, we start by hiring a canal boat in the Midlands, a wholly new adventure for us, but one we’ve mused about many times and out of the virus something different comes! After that it’s a revisit to the Cotswolds, revisit to Rutland Water and finally a new adventure in the Yorkshire Moors, just north of Scarborough.
Firstly though, we get a weekend on the south coast courtesy of Father-in-Law and some stunning weather to make up for the recent several weeks of Yorkshire rain.
Poppies looking good!
Comments
Post a Comment