The first outing of 2015 and the weather was kind, cold but clear and dry! As it was Cath’s birthday weekend, I decided to select a pub site with hard standing. This leaves no worries about mud and rain and also lets us indulge in a Sunday lunch without cooking it for ourselves!
The Crown at Mickleton was duly selected, offering 5 good sized pitches with some good walks nearby as well. The drive there brought back some memories as it took the same path that we took to our very first caravan campsite namely Doe Park. Mickleton being just a bit further up the same road. It’s a windy and hilly route so it takes some care and navigation – a brave first outing with the ‘van when I come to think of it!
We duly arrived and pulled up at the pub. With a warm welcome we were given our pitch number and told of the black and then blue doors that were the toilet block at the back of the pub. Some confusion there – only for us to discover that they were now actually grey! The pitches were indeed large, we soon reversed in and got set up.
New this trip were the vent covers, designed to be put in place when temperatures drop below 8 degrees. Well this trip qualified for that, so I put them on. It must have helped as they cover a large portion of the two external vents. Although a draft could still be felt coming through the kitchen a little. Saturday came and went as usual: film, food, TV, bed. I’d brought all of Cath’s favourite films, so she was pleased, first film was ‘The Green Mile’.
Sunday came and a walk was to be had. An old railway track was available to us just at the back of the site. No track left unfortunately, but the old railway line made for a good easy walk on the flat. We soon found our way into Middleton-on-Tees where we found a fellow walker and had some good company and a good chat until we reached the town centre. Unbelievably we found a tourist information shop there with thimbles, only to discover neither of us had brought any money! Gutted, we decided we would return home and call back with the car!
Following the advice of our fellow walker, we chose the return journey to be on the opposite side of the river, following it until we reached Mickleton again. Well this was quite the opposite of the walk there, the river path was quite steep, narrow, muddy, difficult and exhausting! Some points even had my vertigo fear alarmed as I looked down at the river Tees at quite some height, standing only on a little piece of mud a few inches wide! After quite a journey we eventually found the bridge that we would cross to reach Mickleton. This involved walking through some rather boggy patches, making quite a mess of our attire! After one last final uphill struggle we reached the main road and walked back to the site.
We changed our clothes and headed for the tourist shop, but alas we were too late. It had closed for the day, so we decided that we would return in the morning to purchase our well deserved thimble! Upon returning back to the site we headed straight for the pub in hope that we hadn’t missed last orders for meals. We were relieved to be allocated a nice table and relaxed into a lovely Sunday lunch. Following this and a couple of glasses of wine, we returned to the caravan and settled into a couple of films including Les Miserables. The night as usual passed by quickly and Monday was upon us.
Our usual packing up routine kicked in and we left the site just gone 10am. Before the final hitch of the ‘van, we managed to get back to the tourist information shop and purchase our thimble. Return journey was fine and we soon had then’van back at storage, albeit a little dirty! Heading off home we relished in the excitement of the touring days to come this year!
- Date: 24th January 2015
- Nights: 2
- Pitch #: 2
- GPS: 54.608139, -2.051404
