Exploring still

Sunday was a rare treat for us - we went out for a few hours and did a bit more exploring of this beautiful area that is now our home, or as my son (a committed City boy) so fondly puts it 'The Outback'.....! I never cease to be staggered by the beauty of this countryside - in places it was like miles upon miles of patchwork quilt of fields. Wonderful views stretching over miles and miles, dartmoor in the background and the sea down by the coast.

Sunday was also an absolutely super day weather wise, the temperature was around 18 - 20, but the wind was certainly cool. Firstly we went to a place called Beesands where we had a spot of lunch at the Cricket Inn. It's hard not to be biased because of our splendid food, but I thought what we had was just ok, service was good though - even if I did get a Fish Pie instead of a Shephards....but once again for a pub on the coastline the views were just outstanding! We sat in the sun and to behonest you could have been enjoying a June day - not a late September day.

After that we went to Hallsands where in 1917 a whole village was swept away into the sea.... the ruins are still visible from a viewing point and it bought home how hard life must have been for people living in those days.

Contrasting that was a fabulous development on the site where 2 sisters from the wrecked village built Prospect House, which was later enlarged into a hotel, and is now a very grand comples of flats and houses, swimming pool and tennis courts. I was quite taken with a very nice end flat (for a cool 425k..!!) but was stopped by SOH at actually asking to have a look round. The views from the development were out of this world - straight on to the sea - but also in the middle of no where......... even going for a pint of milk would have been probably an hours round trip. But look at the view from there...............we also went to East Portlemouth and saw Salcombe from 'the other side' of the the water and again, the beauty of the place just takes your breath away!

Apart from that the Victoria has been fairly busy still, preparing for the change of menu this week - and the smells from the kitchen today have been undeniably sublime - Quiches (for starters), Apple Pies (as shown in the photo here) and Profiteroles for desserts - needless to say I have had to have a little taste......... If the rest of the food is half as good as what James has done today I'm pretty sure we're on to a winner with the menu.

The website is undergoing a massive change as well - with new photo's etc going on - I'm not doing that, God know's I'm nowhere near that technically literate!! A local young man called Dan has the pleasure of doing that for us, so again, that should be completed and up and running this week.

SOH has been up in one of favourite places this week again - the roof! In readiness for lighting our huge fire in the pub we have to sort out the fan - this sucks the smoke up and out the chimney rather than putting the pub into a fug! Ala the Golden Lion... for those of you that can remember some of the issues we had with the fireplace there.......smoking out the pub and the customers was a common occurence!

I do have some very exciting news which I hope to be able to share with you in the next couple of weeks - but just right now I can't say too much for fear of tempting fate.

But - my biggest excitement this week though is for our first birthday on Thursday - 1 whole year - amazing!! So until Thursday dear blog readers.................