Mick's Motoring April Adventure

[CitroJim]

Looking forward to it Mick

[mickthemaverick]

The car is prepared and ready for the off, just need to pack my bag now and I'll be ready too!!

[CitroJim]

The car is prepared and ready for the off, just need to pack my bag now and I'll be ready too!!

Mine's already packed I'm good to go

[mickthemaverick]

The day began with my usual exercise consisting of a 20 minute game of darts, it went well and I beat myself!!

I'm getting better!

Then I left home at 5.20 and set off towards Hitchin where I planned to fill up. When I got there at 5.50 the Shell garage had not opened so I carried on in darkness until 10 minutes later I saw the first signs of dawn:

The sun is nearly here

I couldn't resist the opportunity to find a suitable tree for one of my favourite silouette shots against the rising sun:

A well shaped tree

I carried on towards Jim's and eventually started being blinded by the sun in the rear view mirror:

The offender

The image I had

As I arrived at Jim's there was time for another direct shot as the sun had got above the horizon:

Made it to Jim's

So with Jim aboard we set off on our trip to the auction in King's Lynn and the camera stayed in the pocket.

Once there it was time for me to narrow my choices down to name the one car I would have and after walking round the entire selection I had shortlisted 3 possibles:

Auction Room

Gazelle

Gazelle Interior

Unimog

My choice revealed in the right place

Having made the decisions, I'll leave Jim to post his, we headed off to find some lunch. We had that in a very pleasant pub on the way to Hunstanton and then set off to have a general nose around. We found a site with a garden centre and antiques barns and spent an hour looking around before heading on to our hotel for the night which is Briarfields Hotel in Titchwell where we have excellent ground floor chalet style rooms around the courtyard with a patio door leading out to my personal parking space:

My personal parking space!!

The room is excellent:

Bedroom 1

Bedroom 2

Bathroom

So we are having an early dinner at 6.30 and then I'll be watching football and Jim I believe will be hitting the sack.

[CitroJim]

I found the beach late this afternoon Magical

Hugely enjoying this adventure

[CitroJim]

My Album from Day 1

https://www.amazon.co.uk/photos/share/n ... k3PsYPhIvh

Therein you'll see a few very tasty cars

And a cool playpark

[toolfan]

Some nice and rarely seen cars and bikes! I would be tempted to bring one home

[mickthemaverick]

Day 2 started with an exceedingly nice breakfast sandwich, they certainly know a bit about a bacon sandwich here:

MTMO - perfect bacon sandwich!

After breakfast we haeaded off along the coastal route to Sheringham station for a look around the North Norfolk Railway via a landmark which is posted on another thread!! The railway threw up some interesting images:

A period postbox

What'sOn

End of crash site?

A proper signal box

A train redy for tomorrow's running.

Leaving the railway we meandered our way down to Broadland, my teenage stomping ground, where I was able to show Jim some of the delights of boating and other Broadland activities, including where I lost my alcohol virginity and where I fell in the river in Potter Heigham!!

Some interesting resin dogs in Latham's Potter Heigham

Potter Heigham Bridge

Thurne Windmill

Finally we carried on down to Gorleston where Jim will be running the Gorleston Cliffs Parkrun tomorrow while I catch up with the weekend's Formula One so far. Tonight we are in a room only guest house so we had to go out to find some supper. Neither of us were that hungry having gorged ourselves in Latham's cafe for lunch so we settled for a light bite in a country inn before returning to the accommodation via a Shell garage where we found yet another chunk of wasteland alongside the forecourt!!:

My light supper

Yet another waste of space

So it's time to chill in front of the TV and then get some sleep before tomorrow's qualifying!!

[mickthemaverick]

Day 3 started for me at 06.00 when I awoke and connected the laptop to Skysports to watch the F1 qualifying - no comment required!!

However the next event was not to plan as Jim messaged me at 7.50ish to say he did not feel up to doing the Parkrun and hence was ready to leave whenever I was. So having planned for the off at 10 we rearranged and settled on 8.30 as the new departure time.

Jim was not feeling too good at all so we decided to head off as planned to start with and see how things went looking for some breakfast. We drove down from Gorleston and then followed the route through Lowestoft, Beccles, Saxmundham, Framlingham, Needham Market and Bildeston to Lavenham where we finally found sustenance and had a stroll round to admire the beautiful buildings in no particular order:

The provider of breakfast rolls on the left

The Angel Hotel

Opposite the Market Cross

The Centre cottage

The Market Cross

The Market Cross inscription

One side of the Market Place

In memorial

The Market Keepers Cottage

The dedication plaque in the Market Place

Having been enthralled with the beauty of Lavenham we remounted and headed out towards Jim's as he was beginning to feel worse.

We arrived back to Jim's intact and he was able to get inside and hopefully be able to get himself feeling better.
I came straight home from there mulling over the terrific trip we'd had with many lovely places and exciting sights covered. It was unfortunate that Jim had a rough night and missed his Gorleston Cliffs Parkrun which was to have been a highlight for him, I had mine on Friday in Potter Heigham, my spiritual home, but we both enjoyed the auction preview immensely and overall a great trip with an unfortunate ending. My next trip is the reincarnated Welsh Wander in May with Bob in the navigator's seat so watch out for that one!!

[CitroJim]

Massive thanks Mick for the few days away and giving me a much-needed break and change of scenery

Once again, parts of the UK I've never previously set foot in were visited and found to be very agreeable. I was quite surprised at just how lovely the bits of Norfolk and Suffolk we traversed were!

There were some delightful highlights, not least the Car Auction preview, Potter Higham and Lavenham - although I was sadly unable to fully appreciate it.

A shame the wheels somewhat fell off toward the end but with me, it's something that goes with the territory and happens far too often

I spotted this bike in Lavenham - it looked very much how I felt...

The tea room looked good though...

Here's to the next adventure

[Gibbo2286]

My first job in a garage when I left school involved riding one of those bikes all over Birmingham collecting spares for the workshop, imagine a huge Wolseley flywheel or a Ford van petrol tank balanced on the basket, that was me. I spent a lot of time waiting at the parts counter at the Lucas works and nearly ran over a point duty cop when the brakes failed. He stopped all the traffic came over and gave me a right telling off "Get the damn brakes fixed."

[CitroJim]

Gosh Eric A great way to keep fit though

[Vic Evans]

Whilst still at school my Friday evening & Saturday job was serving & making deliveries for a local greengrocer.
Deliveries at any distance were done in shop's van but local stuff was by me on a carrier bike like one shown.
Christmas time on the bike was fun trying to avoid pedestrians whilst delivering tall trees down the very narrow street.

[mickthemaverick]

I don't know what the world is coming to!! I posted some beautiful pictures of Lavenham and three of its significant plaques, including references to 1257, 1501 and WW2, and Jim throws up a picture of a rusty old boneshaker and that gets all the comments!!

[CitroJim]

I don't know what the world is coming to!! I posted some beautiful pictures of Lavenham and three of its significant plaques, including references to 1257, 1501 and WW2, and Jim throws up a picture of a rusty old boneshaker and that gets all the comments!!

Sorry Mick