July 2025: The plan was to take his Moose-ship out for an extended trip – perhaps as far as Yorkshire. So the first day was from home to Stratford-upon-Avon staying at ‘The Moat’, a CL we found via the Pitchup App. Site is close to Stratford-upon-Avon. We rocked up and thought for a minute we’d be staying in a commercial ‘yard’ or something but no! After driving through the gate we were met with a perfectly flat grassed area. The site even had loos and a shower. All things considered, a good site that we may well use again.

Things we forgot #1: the table!!!

A very quiet site with plenty of room

Cheers!

Next day we travelled up the motorway system to Graham, Meg and Henry’s home…Stayed one night as they were on the point of going on holiday for two weeks. We did go and see Henry’s swimming session… Meg cooked a cracking lasagne that evening.

Time to move on. We intended to make our way to Chester/Wirral area before moving on to Liverpool and Lancashire.

Our next planned stopover was a CL near Market Drayton.

The CL was in the middle of nowhere in particular. We discovered directions and maps showing local walks so we set off for a 4 miles romp! As it happens, we came across this superb pub that was serving evening meals – well it would be rude not to! We tucked in to possible the best ‘steak and ale’ pie in recent years.

The evening went rapidly downhill thereafter after encountering a field full of cows. A tactical retreat was certainly in order…

Moving on involved a shimmy through Nantwich, then up to our next port of call in Chester. Problem was just north of Nantwich they’d closed the road (reason unknown) meaning everyone needed to turn around. After a nifty piece of ‘on-the-hoof’ navigation we transferred to the A41 as part of a long and slow moving convoy of lorries and cars to out us back on the road to Chester. Overnight stop with Lynn and Paul including a ‘Fish Supper’ and a beer in Thurstaston.

West Kirby next day and a much calmer journey – well 15 or so miles anyway!! Two day stopover with Judith and Steve.

Steve and I spent several hours attempting to resolve a fault with the off-side rear driving light – to no avail.

Merseyside and Lancashire were next on the tour. A very brief visit to Michelle, Pete and Ash on our way to Burscough and it was at the latter destination that the weather took a turn for the worse!!

However, we did manage a sneaky trip to IKEA in Warrington to buy lots of stuff we didn’t know we needed! Lunch was good though even if half of Merseyside were queuing to get their lunch at the same time.

With our life-long chums Marianne and Ray we plotted an escape plan to Derbyshire – Carsington Water in fact. We set off but were passed by M & R as we refuelled. Strangely though, we ended up in front of them all the way to the destination – a posh Caravan and Motorhome site. Reassuringly expensive, at least it kept most of the riff-raff out (although Ray snook in under the wire)..

Lucky for us the weather improved during our stay and even managed to catch some beams!

Later….Marianne played a mean game of ‘Go Fish’ claiming she didn’t know how to play it…

After three great days with M & R, turned south intending to stop with Pat on our way back home. First stop was to resupply at a large Sainsburys on the outskirts of Derby. Massive carpark with virtually no cars parked. Store was equally devoid of life! Wasted a great deal of time trying to track down a replacement Calor Gas cylinder without success so we opted to go straight to our next stopover at Theddingthorpe not far from Market Harborough. Once on the M1 the sky unzipped with torrential rain for 20 or so minutes.

We found the CL easily enough but elected to go and visit Foxton Locks as an interesting aside.

The CL turned out to be OK ish. At least it was flat.

Pats’ the following day with a forced march along the canal tow path. Even walked past a pub that was open!!

Trip ended up being 825 miles – shorter than we’d intended but we did see most of our relatives and friends in the north…and Moose behaved himself very well.