Looping the London Loop: Section 1

So I think it's fair to say 2014 was a year of highs and lows ( post the glory carefree years of childhood I think I'd struggle to find a year that wasn't). My major high was moving into a house that I adore, and that came with the added bonus of spending lots of wonderful time with my parents while I got them to help me personalise it ( ie put up shelves, paint walls, landscape gardens). The major low was that I did pretty much zero exercise and am not exactly in peak physical form.

So......a plan was needed for 2015 and that plan has come in the form of walking a route around the outskirts of London called the London Loop. The idea for the loop was started in 1990 by a group of walking enthusiasts / local authority representatives. The idea being to encourage urban living Londoners to discover the green spaces on their doorstop, and ideally to leave the car behind for the day. 

The route starts south east in Old Erith, and returns to Purfleet 150 miles later. The route is split into day walks of around 10 miles each, so 15 sections, but each walk gives options to end earlier. They all start and end at train stations within zone 6. Have Oyster card, will travel.

My friend Becky was up for it, and we decided walking through the seasons would be good, so January 15th was our first walk. The day before the met office issued a yellow weather warning so we were kind of expecting Walk 1 to be weathered off....but the weather gods were kind to us and delivered close to zero temperatures but no rain or sleet.

So Sunday 8am I found myself packing my waterproofs, loading the thermos up and layering up to head to our first destination - Old Erith. The train journey itself was an adventure - at the risk of being a geek - I got to take a train from our new, and pretty gorgeous Blackfriars station, where the trains leave from a bridge over the thames with glorious views of the river. Becky joined me along the route. We both looked like Michelin men ( did I mention it was close to zero degrees?) so it was lucky that the London borough of Bexley didn't seem to be the most stylish of places. It is however a great place to trade scrap metal, dump rubbish or own a mangy dog. Despite Old Erith's lack of immediate charms we had a great day and the 9 miles flew by. It's not meant to be the most attractive of the walks, but it does take you to a fascinating country estate along the way, Hall Place. The house is now owned by the council, but was originally built in 1540 by an ex Mayor of London. The building was then unsympathetically extended by its then owner Sir Robert Austen - giving a fabulous architectural mismatch. We particular loved the crazy topiary figures in the gardens. Oh and top marks for the cafe - quite possibly the best Jacket Potato and baked beans I've ever eaten.

Bring on Section 2....

Swimming with Turtles

Continuing the theme of moving more, we wanted to spend more time in the water. All of my friends ( popular island....) who have visited previously recommended a boat trip. On our trip into Bridgetown we saw some really gorgeous boats - lots of sexy, sleek Catamaran's ( Cool Runnings stands out with their classy Navy and White gorgeous boats). But while they are absolutely my kind of thing to sail around, if we were wanting to swim or snorkel experience tells me the fewer people the better. I've had too many experiences with many completely clueless swimmers knocking my mask off with their fins to know that the bigger the boat, the worse the swimmers.

So a bit more research found me a fisherman's boat with max capacity 6 people which is a run by an Islander called Charles Bisante who runs Cliff Sharker ( http://www.cliffsharker.com/en/mobile). Charles specialises in turtle trips and teaching people to free dive. It took a few days for him to be running the trip we wanted but a couple of days before we returned home it was go, go, go. 

The boat was cool, I didn't get  good photo of the front but it had a cool painting of an ample chested mermaid. Charles was a delight - friendly, patient and generous with his rum servings. There were 5 of us on the trip, and after we waded into the water and into the boat we travelled up the west coast towards Carlisle Bay. The trip left at 7am so we were nice and early to see the turtles. Barbados has the second largest population of the endangered Hawksbill Turtles in the Caribbean, along with a large number of Green turtles. I've seen Turtles before when diving - such cool looking animals - Disney got it dead right with their portrayal of the chilled out family in Finding Nemo. 

Before we got into the water ( and I was desperate to get in, I'd already seen a green turtle swimming close to our boat and the water was crystal clear) Charles gave us some do's and dont's to protect both the turtles and our forearms when we fed them. He also explained to some others in the group how to snorkel properly ( which was actually really interesting, I've snorkelled a lot as a result of diving I guess, but to have it properly taught was good for me too). 

Geared up, in I went. It's so refreshing not having an Oxygen tank on your back that snorkelling can be a delight sometimes compared to diving. Within minutes two Green turtles arrive, followed by a baby turtle. Slowly a Hawksbill turns up - an old guy who was much less sociable/ interested in is than the people pleasing Green's. We were with them, just us 5 for over an hour. At one point we had 6 turtles with us. Just swimming around and they swam with us. It was without question the best animal experience of my life. I've been lucky enough to have some great experiences - swimming with whale sharks in Westerm Australia, seen a lion hunt down and kill a Zebra in the Serengeti and many others but this was so intimate. I got knocked on the tummy by the baby. I had several big long swim's eye to eye with the young Green's. They made me laugh just with their old funny looking faces, but wow they are graceful swimmers. Charles let us feed them, and apart from the first bit of fish he gave me going right down my bikini top ( not where I want a turtle nibbling for food) it was awesome. They got so close to us. Breathtaking. 

The rest of the trip was great, we visited 3 wrecks - one of which was a Colombian drugs boat caught in 1990 and sunk not even 10 metres off shore. I was actually impressed how much you could see even if you didn't free dive down closer to the boat. Lots of fish and coral starting to form. 

We then cruised into Bridgetown with the obligatory Bob Marley pumped up, we drank Rum Punch and we sped down to our beach back down South laughing and smiling all the way.

Busy doing nothing

So I wanted to write something on Saturday, and again on Sunday but in truth there was little to say. Our days involve 7am walks along the beach in search of coffee ( leading us to Surfers Cafe in Oistins, amazing views, average food), mid morning swims, 2 for 1 bottles of Carib and deciding whether to have the flying fish with rice and peas or macaroni pie. Tricky. 

Everything in barbados is just too easy. The sun, though strong, is accompanied by a cool breeze; Our hotel ( butterfly beach, highly recommend) has plenty of beautifully located shady sun loungers meaning no risk of sunburn, the bus stop is directly outside the hotel. So there really is nothing to get at all bothered about - not even a mosquito. So we go with it, we read, we sleep, we enjoy the calm. 

Sunday night though over dinner at Cafe Luna in Miami Beach ( gorgeous food but reserve ahead) we decided we needed to do something. We had to move more. So Monday morning 8am we boarded the locals bus to Speightstown ( 2 Barbadian $ = 70p) along with all of the commuters off to their various jobs around the island. The locals are all immaculately turned out wearing primary colours and big lovely smiles. There's a lot more hand shaking and back slapping than you see on the 8.01 Northern Line from Totteridge & Whetstone. About an hour into the journey we are back on the coast road , and we exit at a place called Holetown in search of breakfast. Small, cute but full of American style mall's we find a spot for food, but then start a walk in search of a private bay to swim in. We didn't have to walk far before the perfect spot presented itself, and we spent a happy 30 minutes floating near a man made reef looking for signs of turtles. The Ocean here is a lot kinder than the much more aggressive Indian Ocean, I'm still bearing the scar from when the Indian spat me out in Sri Lanka a mere 9 months ago.

We then make a foolish decision to walk to Speightstown on the basis that it doesn't look that far on the map....7 miles later it's fair to say we have fully explored the North West coastline. We saw many fancy resorts ( the Fairmont appears to be exclusively for rich US pensioners - avoid!), some incredible looking villas ( my favourite had pineapple railings to prevent people like me from getting in) and lots of lots of truly magnificent beaches. I still can't get over how quiet they all were - and this is peak season. 

As a consequence of our mammoth trek, we arrived into Speightstown looking a lot less refreshed than we'd have liked. Fortunately we were heading to a relaxed laid back place I'd heard about called The Fisherman's Pub, which served Bajan specialities down by the water. We arrived to the warmest welcome and settled into a shady spot overlooking the sea. Fish cakes, macaroni pie and salad were ordered , along with a bottle of Banks beer all for the bargain price of £4. Our host came over to chat and to welcome us to Barbados and to thank us for coming to his place. Clement was a delight, I told him that I was going to write about him so he posed for me and told us how business had been for the last few years. Tough he told us, especially while the UK had been struggling. So he said he decided to smarten himself up and put on a bow tie to make himself feel better. Things have been picking up ever since. So far he's my highlight of barbados, a beautiful soul. 

Flying Fish Time

So New Year's Day arrives pretty early for  us, and I rope Helen into a 7am Powerwalk. I have an ulterior motive, my New Years resolution is to complete a walk called the London Loop with my friend Becky. Our first walk is set up for mid January- so a training walk was needed. You know to ease me in gently. Our attempts to walk up the west coast was thwarted by firstly solid rocks blocking our way along the beach, and then secondly by a police car blocking the beach road. So we take the long way round and eventually find ourselves drinking coffee in the little beachside town of St Lawrence gap about a 30 minute walk from our place.

Coffee over we head back to our rustic ( ie run down) hotel near Oistins and relax under some palm trees enjoying the sea view ahead of us.

That night we walked into Oistins to enjoy our first taste of local specialty flying fish. After risking walking past the fishing port ( see previous blogs for the tales of fishermen playing with there erm tackle in various beachside destinations I've visited) we get charmed into sitting at a little shack by a woman with the biggest smile I've ever seen. Fish were grilled, accompanied by rice and peas and macaroni pie - and we enjoyed watching the locals getting involved in road tennis.....happy holidays x

Happy 2015 - Island Style

Continuing a tradition of recent years, I'm celebrating the dawn of a new year on a different continent. This year the Caribbean has the pleasure (?) of

my company. I've been to the Caribbean once before - to the beautiful small island of Grenada, just north of Venezuala. 31st December 2014 sees me leaving a frosty London destined for Barbados. 

I'm not sure that arriving at 8pm was best preparation for finding the best spot for New Years, which is why we found ourselves celebrating with bottles of the local lager andlays BBQ flavoured crisps - but hey I can handle that

Happy New Year everyone x