Tuesday 28 July 2009

Going south

My turn this time - I'm off to England tomorrow morning. I'm going to a wedding in Maidstone on Thursday, then popping down to Southampton for a weekend with friends there, and then on to Devon to see my sister and family and then to visit Val in Torquay.

I'll be back here, lots of miles later, next week. Fingers crossed for not too many traffic jams!!

Wednesday 22 July 2009

Sue's wall

Sue has been working hard in our garden at the Barn. We have a tumbled old stone wall which is very overgrown with all manner of plantlife. Sue has an ambition to turn the whole thing into a rockery. She has made a good start, and is pictured by the wall, today, with Basil.

Expect more pictures soon from Sue!

Tuesday 14 July 2009

Roskhill Barn

"Home" - 13th July 2009

Monday 13 July 2009

Busy, Busy Skye

The place is packed!

I drove to Rowan Cottage on Saturday morning to do the regular turn-round, and found myself in a long convoy of cars... We are so used to having the roads entirely to ourselves - it's quite a novelty to be among other traffic!

We have just taken a booking for our last un-booked week of the summer, and new enquiries are still coming in at the rate of about two per day. We are enjoying very good weather so far this summer, too, which no doubt is attracting even more visitors.

I'm glad we specialise in self catering, and not B&B. We only have to work really hard on Saturdays, while the B&B people are at it all the time, which must be exhausting.

Friday 3 July 2009

Sat-Nav

No - I'm not referring to the little box that people stick to their car windscreen and then drive up the motorway with a little arrow on the screen pointing 'straight on'.... I've discovered more adventurous walking possibilities by using a hand-held GPS device. Here's mine...


The screen here (sorry about the refections!) is just showing the 'trip' display, which can be set to show a number of different readouts. I've set mine to show (from the top) how far I've walked (4.51 miles) the Grid reference of where I am (NG 22097 38334 in this picture - enter that into http://wtp2.appspot.com/wheresthepath.htm to see where I was...) , the time of day, how long I've been on my trip, and (just out of sight) my elevation above sea level.

There are five other screen views which can be scrolled through - the whole lot is controlled by only four buttons, so it's easy to operate, and it's waterproof and shockproof too.

The website I've linked to above enables me to plot a route for a walk on the ordnance survey map, then upload the route onto the eTrex. A display on the eTrex screen then shows me the route which I follow as I walk, and it's accurate to just a few metres. It also keeps a record of where I have actually been, so when I get home, I can download my 'track' from the eTrex to the map on the computer. I can also press a button which puts a 'waymark' onto my track. I do this when I take a photograph, so when I am looking at the map when I get home, I have a pinpoint accurate record of where I was when I took each photo.

It's the best £70 I've spent in years (plus the annoying £15 for a cable to connect it to the computer) but it has enabled me to confidently set out for walks through this kind of pathless country...

...to discover this kind of scenery...


Sue is building up her walking stamina, and will be joining me for some longer walks soon!