Dartmouth

Gavin worked until about midday today, and while he was working, Xena was out for a walk with P and her doggy pals and I finally got round to packing, clearing the fridge, some laundry...and then finally we were off for our holiday to Devon.

The traffic was very heavy, in fact it was awful and our journey which should have been 3hrs 45 mins took over 5 hours. At one point we were inching along, according to the car reading of the the outside temperature it was 33C (I don't think that was correct) and the air conditioning was not working properly. Adam also had an awful journey from Cambridge, his journey took 3 hours longer than expected.

When we finally reached our holiday accommodation we could not have been more delighted. It is a converted barn on a farm just outside Dartmouth, it has been beautifully fitted out and actually it won an architectural award for the barn conversion.The owner, who farms the two neighbouring farms, has done a superb job - it is the first time we have stayed in holiday accommodation where the kitchen is kitted out with beautiful crockery, cutlery and glassware - usually you get the sense that it is old stuff raided from friend's attics. I was not surprised to hear it is fully booked for the rest of this year and nearly all of next year and the next!

We arrived so late that we only had time to unpack, give Xena a bit of a run around in the garden, and then go into town for supper. The Sainsbury's delivery arrived as we arrived - excellent timing!  We enjoyed a delicious fish supper at a restaurant called Bushells overlooking the Dart Harbour with this view on to Kingswear. It was very pleasant to sit outside in a sleeveless summer dress all evening and not feel cold, it was still so warm at 9pm. Adam and Pip were so delayed in traffic that they missed joining us for supper, but the restaurant kindly allowed us to order a take away for them which we took back at the end of our meal when they had just arrived at the barn.

A long day and now it is bedtime, we look forward to exploring this area tomorrow - great weather is forecast for the entire week.