Friday 5 June

The day in Cleethorpes starts sunny with a wee nip in the air. We are on the road early as Dave and Kate need to get to work. We head into the Pennines of NE Yorkshire. First stop is the lovely town of Richmond: green fields, stone houses/bridges/fences. On the way I give Tina a truck stop experience: the cheapest cup of tea and coffee, chip butties (Tina spells butty as buttie), bolted seats with every plastic cover worn or ripped.

On south to Harrogate and a nice lunch. Witnessed an ugly in-your-face finger-pointing exchange between a non-white traffic warden giving a ticket to a fat-bellied, shaven head aggressive white guy. Ugly.

Beautiful rural drive among the hills and dry stone fences (ie no cement). Brief look around Keighly (pronounced Keithly). Heavy rain.

We end up at our destination Haworth. Before going to the accommodation we immediately go to the church where the Brontes are buried. Haworth is the home of the Brontes. Tina goes to the Bronte Museum whilst I seek refuge from the cold and heay rain in the 17th century pub, The Kings Arms. I had creamed lentil soup.

We then find our bed and breakfast, The Thyme House. A small room but nicely appointed. They only opened in 2008 and spent a lot of money to get it right. We rest. Very comfortable. The owner recommends Weavers restaurant and books for us. All the food there is home prepared. Tina has a superb, fresh pate. For mains we have home cooked, comfort food as it is still raining heavily and is cold. Tina has Shepherds Pie with Pickled Red Cabbage. I have REAL sausages, very fresh and full of genuine ingredients that can be tasted. I also have creamy mashed potatoes and a thick onion gravy (sort of like a thick onion soup). Shared veges are spring cabbage and mashed carrot and swede. Lovely. Everything well cooked and excellent service. A real home cooked meal on a grotty night.

But the highlight was the table next to us. Three generations. The was grandma and grandpa; a lovely couple and it seemed they were both having a birthday but they end up paying which struck us as odd. The youngest was the grandson Ollie. Throughout the meal the buds of his iPod Touch were in his ears whilst his right hand shuffled through songs. His left hand texted fevourishly on his cell phone. At the end of the meal the grandfather thanked Ollie for attending!!! A thoroughly modern yuff.

Now the parents who permitted this behaviour. Dad seemed very nice - quite and said little. Not that he was given much chance. Blonde Mum was a real piece of goods. She was a Mega Fluffy Bunny! Tina called her a right cow! Here are some of her gems gems:
- "I dropped Ollie off at school this morning and went back to bet for an hour" (lucky her!)
- remember tomorrow is the anniversary if D Day,1944:
a. she asks "What are we celebrating?"
b. she answers her own question with "The Americans liberating France" (hmmm, what about the British, Canadians, Free French etc etc?)
c. and here is the gem, she asks "Were the French happy to see them?" (Nah, the French were loving Nazi rule!)