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Sunday the 8th June 2008.... Welcome to RossMag..... Here we are entering the main holiday season in the UK. The weather is finally improving and we at RossMag have already had several good weeks in our caravan on the Lancashire Canal. Another Bank Holiday has passed and true to tradition, there was no local events, the shops held sales and the weather was appalling, nothing new there then!
We took our grandson to the caravan with us that school holiday week and we think that he must have been glad to get back home by the end of it. There were no other children on site and we do not have a playground, he was restricted to playing on our old bicycle during the brief interludes when the rain stopped.
A warning to prospective caravan owners with children, for a good family holiday please ensure that you select your sites carefully. Make sure that there is something for the little ones to do when you get there as there is little for them to do in a caravan, why go away if you are going to rely on the television and game boxes to entertain them? Please also be aware that children are the responsibility of parents, do not rely on the warden or other holidaymakers to keep an eye on them as,is the case far too often (from past Seabreeze experience).
We are now in the eleventh week of the season and our site in Lancashire has been well stocked with caravans but less well stocked with people. It has been very quiet so far and we have pretty much had the site to ourselves! This could be due to any number of reasons the most likely is the current cost of petrol here in the UK. The local price of petrol currently is £1.18 per litre and diesel £1.30 per litre and, we hear on the news this morning, crude oil has just hit a new high on world markets, so where do we go from here, back to the bicycle?
We are all subject to the movements of the oil market but there are simple steps that can be taken to reduce the cost of motoring. It seems odd that whilst we all complain reducing car use for short journeys, reducing speed on the road, controlling acceleration and braking times etc. would reap huge benefits, there seems little evidence that these steps are being followed.
When taking our regular trips along the motorway at or just below the national speed limit of 70 MPH to get the best possible mileage from our small family saloon (ideally our economy speed is 60 MPH but we don't want hooters blown at us!) We often find that we are the slowest vehicle on the road by far. Not only are we overtaken by a seemingly endless procession of gas guzzling 4WD's with one person on board but also by commercial vehicles giving the bosses van a real workout! Recently our council sent out men in transit vans to stick 'Dog fouling warning labels' on lampposts, a task that could almost certainly have been carried out on foot or by using a bicycle, will the regulation ever be enforced we ask ourselves?. An extension to the local 'three men, three vans to carry out any minor repair job when the public is paying' policy, we believe! Sometimes it appears that there are three men to four vans - but that is another matter!
Families will now be carefully considering their leisure and non-essential travel expenditure very seriously indeed. The escalating costs and difficulties involved in air travel are not making foreign holidays a good option either.
Seabreeze Campsite (our silent partner) is now well booked for the holiday season with the camping and caravan field is finally open, following the delayed start because of wet weather. Sadly the Bank Holiday period was somewhat quiet with cancellations again because inclement weather outside the area. There has also been several cancellations due to the increased cost of travelling and the delays on the rail network due to modifications which has not helped either, we wont mention the high fares, such is life!
Holidays in the UK must still be the best family option as we have so many wonderful places to stay in or just to visit. Many years ago when we were bringing up a young family with little money to spare, what's new? We discovered several holiday locations very close to where we lived and with little travelling or expense we still managed some good family holidays.
Why not get a map out, or better still explore your local area using the Microsoft Map facility using the wonderful 'birds eye view' button to find somewhere you have not yet discovered?
Looking out of the window this morning we can see the dawn of a beautiful day and with the sun due to set at nearly 22:00 hrs it should also be a fine long summer day. RossMag and Beloved along with our assorted pets will be going to our caravan tomorrow morning as today is already spoken for.
Last month we drew attention to an article in the Daily Telegraph on the future of Coastal Defences for the North Norfolk Coast.
In extracts taken from this, highly speculative report, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/03/31/easwamp131.xml it is stated that: -
//…….. Further plans to abandon parts of the coast of Eastern England to the sea are expected from the Environment Agency this year, following the suggestion that six villages around the Norfolk Broads might have to be given up to flooding within the next 100 years.
The six Norfolk villages at risk under the Natural England proposal are Eccles, Sea Palling, Waxham, Horsey, Hickling and Potter Heigham.
Natural England's study follows the Environment Agency's proposed withdrawal of maintenance of sea defences in the Blyth estuary, between Walberswick and Southwold, last autumn, which campaigners believe is likely to be a test case for estuaries along the coast. Campaigners say a policy change at the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has led to the presumption that coastal management will be withdrawn in areas where the cost to the public cannot be justified……..//
Our country is not so big that we can afford to let vast tracts of it disappear into the sea albeit it in a hundred years or so, we must think about our children and our children's children. (Moody Blues?).
Again we urge all our visitors to support the inhabitants of the North Norfolk coast. Please continue to visit and take holidays in the region where you will be made to feel most welcome and damn all scaremongers.
On-line petition: - http://www.happisburgh.org.uk/ and then click on 'news and pictures of erosion' then click on 'sign our petition' and then click on 'news and pictures of erosion' then click on 'sign our petition Your support will be much appreciated.
In the meantime the good citizens and business' of the coastal areas of Norfolk including Seabreeze Campsite will continue to get on with their lives safe in the knowledge that this is all speculation!
That is all for this month. Please explore our holiday pages and visit us again in the future! . . . . . . . . . .RossMag
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