Ile de Ré Summer Holidays 2010

In the early summers of my childhood, my Dad and Mum packed my brother Phil and I, still sleeping, into the back of our family car, with a caravan in tow, and drove us to the south of France each year.   The journeys and holidays were long and packed with some of the strongest memories I’ll keep.  Those of us lucky enough to have any Family Holiday as children will always keep those memories, and looking back on this particular branch of the Haygarth family’s trip to the Ile de Ré, I know that the beat goes on and on, and as many families do, we’ve done our own version of the full circle.

With a car packed with everything from bikes to buckets, we lifted the children from their beds at 2:30am and set off to Dover. Elsie proved that despite not knowing what the heck was going on, she could hold a pretty good conversation for a two year old in the dead of night, but we eventually got her settled by Stafford, an hour od so later.  Arriving at Dover a bit blearly eyed and checking onto the ferry was a bit of basic relief. Anything like that carries with it an irritating deadline and the need for a bit of buffer time, but at least we were there now, intact, in time, and in need of medium cappuccino with an extra shot. (more…)

Deershed Festival 2010. Family Frolics in Sunny Yorkshire

Fantastic 24 hours camping at the Deershed Festival over near Thirsk this weekend. Sandwiched between rain on Friday and Sunday, we managed to enjoy a pretty sunny day of musing and moseying to music and general arts. (more…)

Jane and Dips’ house: Oxford’s alternative May Day weekend

Oxford’s tradition of May Day (or rather May Morning) is a bit much sometimes with young children (when, generally, an early morning is not something you do by choice) and when we went to stay with old mates Dips and Jane in their Oxford home, the last thing we wanted was to hit the pubs at 6am. However, with four grown ups catering for the needs of four children, we made a good effort at comprimise by hitting the pubs around about midday and pretty much keeping going – albeit at a cultured snail’s pace, as the day progressed.

The visit – pretty long overdue – was a great chance to hang out and catch up with great friends, and sandwiched between pretty good car journeys either end, wound up being a great chilled out time.

Photos of some general fun here and a video below… followed by a few photos from Jane here too

Bill Dalkin turns 70

We had a great time at the weekend, a family get-together in beautiful sunshine for the Dalkins to celebrate Bill’s 70th. The three daughters – Fiona, Katie and Sally – plus all their family-hangers-on meant a total of 13 family members and four close friends. A bit of a house full by any standards.

Managed a quick run up Ingleborough on Sunday which was a real treat. Got up there pretty much before anyone else was there and had one of thiose tranquil mountain moments all to myself. Fantastic. But spoiled by a few red winey burps from Saturday. Hey ho – can’t have everything.

Brilliant to see the children all together – running about the garden, cheating at football, playing on swings, irritating the dog… in such fantastic sunshine. (more…)

February half term in Peebles – again

If ever there was a good sign that a holiday works, it is that you do it again. There’s a good mix of the things that seem to add up to a good little holiday for the Haygaths at the Peebles Hydro hotel. Too pricey for a full week, but just within the realms of decadence for three nights in Feb half term (especially with three nights for the price of two!).

It was a similar recipe to last year’s holiday there – but different in many ways as Elsie has doubled in age in that short year. (more…)