A perfect day.........

I think it was Lou Reed that sung ''Perfect Day', and considering the trauma's of the past few weeks I had a perfect day yesterday!! In my relationship with SOH (Scrumptious Other Half - Tim) I'm not hugely demanding (stop sniggering at the back thank you!!) but when we came down here we promised each other to take time to appreciate why we came down to this beautiful part of the world. This included regular time off together............... guess when we last had a proper day off together?? That's right - an awful long time ago! So I have pencilled in a regular day off every week from now until the end of September and we started yesterday.

Of course, in this business it's really difficult to have the whole day off without doing some chores, unless you actually go away - yesterday that was the banking and the Booker order........ but after that we had the day to ourselves. We started off by having a visit to the Salcombe Museum - we have had a quick peek before, but SOH wanted to have a proper look and I'm really glad we did as it was incredibly interesting. Two little old Salcombe ladies were the guardians of the museum yesterday, and I never fail to be surprised at Salcombe residents kindness to us both, yesterday was no exception. These two ladies went out of their way to tell us of their memories of Salcombe - and fascinating it was as well!!

For the next part of our day, all I knew was that SOH was taking me to lunch first but I didn't know where. As we approached Trago Mills on the Exeter road SOH said we were going to a little cafe in the shopping centre - I made the appropriate 'lovely' murmurs, desperately hoping he was teasing.... thankfully, he was!!

We were actually headed for a place called Doddiscombsleigh!! As hard to find as it is to pronounce....... but what a lovely ride in the country and the most beautiful tree shaded roads. Oh so very romantic... well I thought so!! Eventually our destination was signposted - The Nobody Inn. A fabulous eclectic mix of furniture and fittings, over 240 whiskies and 200 wines. Really good home-cooked food and the best Summer Pudding (and double cream...!) I have tasted in a long time. We had a lovely time and eavesdropping on the party behind us as they talked about being in charge of a business - it was a bit like listening to a David Brent sound a like.

After that it was a case of going where the fancy took us - and it took us to Dartmoor. I've never been on the moors - driven near , but never through or on. It was fantastic....... the scenery and views in some places was totally breathtaking, with the most adorable horses and foals, yet in others cold and desolate - no more so than Dartmoor Prison in Princetown. What an awful place - really forbidding and actually quite scary - even from a distance. It was easy to imagine how prisoners in the early part of the century must have felt at going to such a desolate area, little heating and the winter's must have been quite horrendous. I wonder what todays prisoners think?

After that we drove to Badgers Holt where the east and west parts of the River Dart meet - again another lovely beauty spot, where rescue chickens are homed - those that come from battery farms etc. We of course had the obligatory cream tea - there's no doubt that Devon and Cornwall do great local produce such as this - and settled in the car afterwards to listen to the cricket for a little while......... what happened? We fell asleep in the car like a pair of old age pensioners!! Coming too to find the car park a lot emptier thann when we got in the car and the shop closed up....! Thankfully not the loos!

So a pleasant trip home ensued, where we crept in via the side entrance, Glo (our bar manager) very kindly offered to close the pub up so we didn't have to venture outside our front door, and we settled down with a couple of G & T's, the TV and a pizza....BLISS! We both agreed it was a PERFECT DAY..........