It’s Sunday 16 April and here we are again – after a very early start we emerge from our cab outside Madame Tussauds where a line of earlier arrivals (some of them familiar) were handing their cases over to a cheerfully welcoming Carwyn. This will be a much longer trip than the previous one – around six and a half hours to Edinburgh – with a couple of comfort stops and a lunch break.
We’re quickly under way, not too much later than the advertised 8.30am start and Christine the organiser counts us two or three times before we get going. Once out of London we head up the western side of the country through familiar territory (to us at least).
Our lunch stop is at Tebay services in Cumbria which has expanded since we came here about twenty-five years ago on our way to visit Barra in the Outer Hebrides. There are lambs in the fields surrounding the service area. We’ll see a lot more of those in the next week!
Leaving Lakeland and heading into the Scottish borderlands I wonder about the cause of the odd softly undulating landscape. We notice that leaf growth is less advanced up here compared the way the trees are starting to green up back home. It’s around 5pm when we arrive at the The Kings Manor, a Best Western
Hotel.
There’s a group dinner at 7.30pm – already pre-ordered.
Me:Chicken Liver and Scotch Whisky Pate served with dressed leaves, house chutney & Scottish oatcakes
Breast of Chicken with Haggis, with a peppercorn brandy cream sauce served with sautéed potatoes and seasonal vegetables
Sticky Toffee Pudding with butterscotch sauce & vanilla ice cream
Angela:Traditional Prawn Cocktail
Oven Baked Fillet of Haddock served on sautéed potatoes, chorizo sausage finished with a tomato, red onion basil salsa
Chocolate & Raspberry Tart served with seasonal berries