Beer - the village (Beer ~ England)

 First week in August

From Canada we flew to the UK using Air Canada,  an airline we will never fly with again. We were right royally stuffed around by them as when we booked them we were unable to reserve seats, after multiple emails and phone calls we got a confirmation email from Air Canada. On check in found that this was a confirmation that our request had been received and we both had middle seats - sorry, not sorry. This was resolved a couple of hours later as Sally took the off chance that the boarding desk could help, and they did. Two aisle seats and one with extra legroom - woo hoo.

Heathrow airport was the quietest we have ever seen and getting through security, immigration, picking up bags and out was the fastest we have ever done. Think we got very lucky.

First few days in the UK were spent with Sue (Sally's sister) and Steve where we got over jet-lag and generally relaxed (thanks guys) before heading off to Warminster via London for a quick brunch catch up with Kate (Richard's sister). The last time we were here plans for renovation were drawn up and now three years later ground floor is done and looks amazing. Front half of house is in keeping with Victorian roots (with bathroom to die for - lions-claw bathtub) and back half (kitchen/dining) is sodding amazing.  Pity I forgot to take photos.

From there it was a few hours drive to Warminster to pick up Doris (Sally's mum) and then down to Beer. Beer is a quaint little fishing village on the south coast that we have been to a few times when we lived in the UK (twenty years ago now) and the centre hasn't changed but has sprawled a bit - but still lovely. 

Our accommodation was a great old house on the hillside overlooking the coast and v close to the coastal path.  One plus was that it came with its very own beach hut. Which we used for a day's and quite happily sat on the promenade watch the world go by. Beach huts are a v sought after commodity in the UK and the average one will set you back $NZ 60,000 - think this one would cost a bit more than that!

Given that we were here in the middle of the school holidays it was a tad manic on the Seaton and Chamouth beaches which we found when we visited.

Seaton is also home to a rather cool little electric tram which has been restored and runs back and forth through wetlands. If you squint you can see Sally and Doris in the middle on the bottom deck of the tram.

Did some quite pleasant walks along parts of the coastal path (which I think pretty much runs around the perimeter of the UK) and given the time of years lots of flowers were out - v pretty.

From Beer it was back to Warminster for a few days with Phil (Sally's brother), Lynne and Alfie (the dog).

Warminster is a typical little market town in Wiltshire and like other towns in the area was hit badly by Covid withs lots of small stores closing down and being boarded up. A young local artist, Tanya Hinton, decided to lighten things up by adding mostly small pictures of wildlife to boarded up buildings, and then to various shops.

From here we next head down to Shoreham-on-Sea.