It has been a quieter week for us in the Dales and probably one of the first periods in a long time that we have spent the whole week in the cottage which has been lovely. We have pottered and got some long overdue jobs done around the house and had a lovely evening with our neighbours. The weather has kept us indoors more than we would have liked but it has given us the opportunity to catch up on some admin' for both ours and Richard's mums house.
Victoria Caves
After a really busy weekend with the kids, we got back out into the hills for a frosty hike up to the Victoria Cave which is a couple of miles outside of Settle. The geography in this area is very unique with limestone cliffs, rocky outcrops, small hillocks and lush green valleys. If you have never hiked out of Settle, it is a must to add to your bucket list, particularly on a blue sky day. The view from the caves is spectacular, with all of the Yorkshire Dales 3 peaks in view and the snow capped mountains of the Lake District in the background. It was a great way to blow off the cobwebs.
MMM magazine
For someone who hated and barely passed their English O levels, Richard has a new found passion for writing. We have had several articles published over the past couple of years in VW Magazine about our travels. This week, we have had an article published in the Motorhomer’s Magazine. The sense of achievement and pride this has given Richard who was always told he was not good at writing at school is wonderful to see. Being paid to write is also pretty fab too!
We were also approached by Alex from Advanture magazine – a very impressive, stylish vanlife magazine. He has asked if he can reprint an article we had in one of his first magazines a few years ago about our Scottish explorations in a special edition that he is currently editing. It is a real privilege to be involved with the magazine and we are excited to see the finished product.
Feeling Festive
It has been a bit of a week being creative and crafty. I finally got round to making the Christmas bunting from the materials I had bought in America. With the vast expanses of white walls in the cottage, it certainly adds a splash of colour for the holiday season. I am now in the process of making some for the van, ready for our next winter camping trip.
Building a wood store
With the weather being wet and miserable outside, Richard decided to turn his energies to some long overdue DIY tasks, starting with the creating of a wood store in the outhouse. Now that we are in mid-winter, we really need somewhere to store wood so we can order a big tonne bag, making it much more economical.
The multifuel stove is our main heat source in the house as we have no central heating and we have been buying large bags of wood every 5 days or so at £22 a bag. We have also used smokeless coal for the first time as it keeps the fire going overnight and keeps the chill of the downstairs rooms. We have been pleasantly surprised how well the fire heats most of the cottage if we leave the living room door open once it is up to temperature.
A lovely evening with the neighbours
We had such a lovely evening earlier this week with our next door neighbours. It is nice being settled in the cottage for a few weeks before our next travels and having visitors. We have a real soft spot for them as Ken reminds us so much of Richard's dad and I think he has taken us under his wings too. I even did some baking, making mice pies, I think I might be getting a bit of an expert at this pastry making! (It helps that I didn’t burn this lot either!!)
Drying washing!
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that we had bought a dehumidifier so we could speed up drying the washing. We went for a Meaco machine with a laundry setting and it has been an absolute Godsend! We had the kids and partners over last weekend so had 2 sets of bedding plus towels to wash and dry. Each load was fully dried within 6-8 hrs!! We can’t believe the amount of water we have emptied out – over 10 litres in 3 days. Hopefully it has also been an investment to stave off any potential damp spots in the house and pretty economical to run at 7p an hour.
The problems with subsidence
With Richard’s mum well and truly settled in her care home and the nature of dementia meaning she will never return home; we have been tasked with the very sad job of selling the home Richard grew up in. It had always been a happy place full of chatter and laughter and it has been heart-breaking having to visit every week (an insurance stipulation) and see it so soulless. We had also noticed big cracks appearing over the past couple of years and the insurance company have finally started work fixing the subsidence.
We are in real limbo as the works can take up to a year to resolve and we can’t sell the house with subsidence so we have no choice but to wait. At least this week saw the start of the works with all the drains being either replaced or lined in parts. We then have to wait for the monitoring phase of up to 6 months to see if it has worked. If not they continue the investigation and start again! Luckily, we are not under massive pressure financially for the care home fees but it is certainly very tying having to visit every week (and costly to us on petrol as it is an hours drive each way!)
A stormy weekend in the Dales
The rain has well and truly returned this week and a wild and windy storm hit the Dales on Saturday. For the first time in a long time I declared Friday a duvet day and stayed in bed most of the days watching hours and hours of Netflix! Sometimes it just has to be done. Richard on the other hand built his woodstore and generally clattered and banged downstairs!
Saturday however was more frustrating as the storm took out our WiFi and mobile phone reception for the most of the day. Not a huge issue, but frustrating as we were trying to upload Sundays YouTube and the photos for this blog. In the end we decided to drive down into Settle once the wind had dropped to get some signal. Well we tried to, our village was yet again cut off with the floods! Luckily we did get just enough signal in the valley so all is good! And we have woken up to full service again.
Hopefully the weather will be a little drier next week so we can get out into the hills abit more and we are really looking forward to our first Christmas party in the village.
Jackie and Richard
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